Robots compete in Fukushima-inspired US challenge

Robots from six countries including the United States, Japan and South Korea went diode-to-diode Friday in a disaster response challenge inspired by the 2011 Fukushima nuclear meltdown. The winner of the DARPA Robotics Challenge (DRC), will be announced Saturday after a two-day competition in California. But they will also win the kudos of triumphing after a three-year robotics contest organized by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), which commissions advanced research for the US Defense Department.

The US military has an implicit mission to respond to humanitarian disaster relief. But in order to do so you need the tools to effectively respond.

DARPA official Brad Tousley

In all, 24 mostly human-shaped bots and their teams won through to the finals. Over the two days, each robot has two chances to compete on an obstacle course comprising eight tasks, including driving, going through a door, opening a valve, punching through a wall and dealing with rubble and stairs. The challenges facing them in Pomona, just east of Los Angeles, were designed specifically with Fukushima in mind. Back then, relief workers were forced to turn back due to radiation exposure.

If the Japanese had had advanced robotics systems that could have used tools that we use in everyday life .. they might have prevented some of the damage from the subsequent hydrogen explosions.

Brad Tousley

Technology DARPA