When a fire breaks out inside a building, firefighters are often unaware of the dangers that can be found there. In the future, small ground robots could recognize these environments to detect the sources of fire or the toxicity of the environment, as well as locate possible victims and safe routes to access them.
Now, a team that includes Noelia Fernández Talavera, from the Rey Juan Carlos University (URJC) in Madrid, and Juan Jesús Roldán-Gómez, from the Autonomous University of Madrid (UAM), both institutions in Spain, has created a prototype of robot capable of performing these functions in real fires.
Predicting the evolution of a fire is very useful to be able to extinguish it.
When firefighters intervene in a fire inside a building they have to face several challenges. One of the biggest problems is the lack of information about the setting, as well as the objectives and dangers found inside.
On some occasions, they do not have plans of the buildings; in others, the fire has been able to radically change them, for example, generating debris in the access roads or toxic atmospheres in certain places.
In these operations, firefighters must make important decisions based on limited information, which can increase the risk of accidents in the short term or occupational diseases in the long term.
The idea of the UAM and URJC researchers is not that robots replace the people who carry out these jobs, but that they protect them and help them carry out their work.
To do this, they propose that their robot intervene before the firefighters, using its sensors to collect information about the scene and the fire, such as temperature, air quality, etc.
The idea of the researchers from the UAM and the URJC is not that robots replace human firefighters, but that they help and protect them during their interventions. (Photo: UAM / URJC)
In addition, the robot can carry one or more normal or thermal cameras to help locate flames and victims, making it easier for firefighters to plan faster interventions with less risk.
“In the future, robots such as the one developed could assume more responsibilities in tasks such as extinguishing the fire itself, the search and rescue of the victims, the mitigation of certain dangers, the prediction of the evolution of the flames, the structural analysis of the building or the transport of materials”, declare the creators of the robot.
The robot that the researchers have designed is modular and low-cost, although with high performance, capable of monitoring the terrain in a directed manner or carrying out autonomous exploration, calculating fast and safe routes to its objectives on its own.
The robot is equipped with ultra-broadband beacons and ultrasonic sensors to help locate and detect obstacles. Sensors have also been installed to measure temperature, relative humidity and air quality (eCO2, TVOC, H2 and ethanol). “These measurements are sent in real time to the base station and are recorded in a database, to measure the environmental conditions of the fire, detect the location of the fire source accurately and allow firefighters to make the most appropriate decisions. in each case”, detail the researchers.
In addition, the team has developed a realistic robot simulator and several intervention environments, all of which allow for mission preparation and training of robot operators prior to interventions with real robots.
Finally, the researchers carried out a series of experiments, in conditions very similar to those of a burning building, at the facilities of the Alcorcón Fire Department. During these tests, the team was able to demonstrate the ability of their robot to work in an unstructured setting with the presence of fire and smoke.
Fernández Talavera and Roldán-Gómez’s team exposes the technical details of their robot in the Journal of Field Robotics, under the title “An autonomous ground robot to support firefighters’ interventions in indoor emergencies”. (Source: UAM)