Rescue Robots' Long Road Ahead

Popular Science

Erik Sofge

2012, DARPA announced the most ambitious robotics competition in history. To kick-start the development of robotic first responders—machines capable of deploying to natural or man-made disasters—the Pentagon’s research agency proposed a series of challenges. Robots would be tasked with navigating and interacting with a mock disaster site. They would open doors, traverse rubble, climb stairs, and turn valves. At times, they would have to act with almost complete autonomy in order to simulate communications breakdowns in a real-life crisis.

Teams from around the world entered the two-year competition. The Pentagon gave some of them multimillion-dollar robots to program, while others received funding to develop their own machines. But despite the generous allotted time and resources, the DARPA Robotics Competition (DRC) would be extremely difficult. Legged robots, by far the most common design in the contest, are notoriously unstable, even when crossing level terrain. For most teams the concern was not winning the DRC. It was surviving it.
The DRC finals were held in June at the Fairplex fairgrounds in Pomona, California. And, sure enough, many robots were hauled away from the two-day event in pieces. Falls were rampant, and every tumble drew sympathetic howls from the thousands of spectators watching from the stands. One humanoid fell so hard, its head flew off its body.