Editor’s Note: This is part of our ongoing news coverage of Japan’s earthquake and nuclear emergency.
Japan’s leading experts in rescue robotics are deploying wheeled and snake-like robots to assist emergency responders in the search for survivors of the devastating earthquake and tsunami that struck the country last Friday.
Details are still scarce, but I’ve gotten word that at least two teams plan to use their search and rescue robots, one team in Tokyo and another in or around Sendai, the city that suffered the most damage in the 8.9 magnitude earthquake and ensuing tsunami. I’m waiting confirmation about a third team, also in Tokyo. (There is no information about the presence of robots at Japan’s troubled Fukushima nuclear power plants, though that would be an ideal application for teleoperated repair and inspection robots.)
Dr. Robin Murphy, director of the Center for Robot-Assisted Search and Rescue (CRASAR) at Texas A&M University, in College Station, and one of the world’s top experts in rescue robotics, confirms that a team led by Satoshi Tadokoro of Tohoku University, in Sendai, and a team led by Eiji Koyanagi from Chiba Institute of Technology’s Future Robotics Technology Center, have deployed, or are about to deploy, their robots.
She reports that Dr. Tadokoro is “en route” to Sendai, where he lives, with the Active Scope Camera, a remote operated 8-meter-long snake-like robot that carries a scope camera and can slither through small spaces. According to Dr. Murphy, it’s “possibly the most capable robot for tight spaces.” At the same time, Dr. Koyanagi will use an agile robot called Quince, which has tank-like tracks and is capable of driving over rubble and climbing stairs, around his home area in Tokyo.
Here’s a video of the Active Scope Camera:
Here’s a video of Quince:
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