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trogman wrote:I'm not familiar with the technology that would allow a robot to stick to a cave roof, but my sense is that it wouldn't work very well, mainly due to the non-uniform characteristics of passage roofs. My thinking is that it would be much simpler to make the robot watertight and have it float across any bodies of water it might encounter.
Trogman
caverdan wrote:Hi Nang,
I'll take a stab at it. I can see a robot like this being very useful in mine rescues more than cave rescue, where you have more chance of running into bad air and extreme heat conditions.
One concern I would have sending in a robot would be, if the cave was heavily decorated in formations. All parts of a cave rescue are important, including putting as little wear and tear on the cave as possible. "leave no trace". A lot of cave formations start by seeping water through cracks. A lot of this happens on ceilings. Having a robot jump up and grip the ceiling could be a bad thing, as far as breaking off formations.
If the person is hurt, transporting a patient would take the most time . If not, search could take the longest.
One of the first thing cavers do when they find a cave is map it. It is common to map as you explore, or leave flagging tape at intersections to help guide you back out. You then pick up all flagging as you leave. When cavers go caving, they usually go with someone who knows the cave or has a map of the cave. We also have a compass to help keep us oriented.
Most people that venture in and get lost are unprepared cavers we like to call "spelunkers". If a cave "rescue group" is called out to find them, then there is a rescue protocol that we follow. It's lengthy and I won't try and explain the whole thing to you, but, we start by gaining control of the cave entrance and assembling teams of people to search for the missing party. One person is put in charge (Incident Commander) of the operation and if it is a well known cave, cavers familiar with the cave will help lead the search teams. There is a very good possibility that someone on the rescue team will have a map of the cave. At the last NCRC training, people with smart phones took a picture of the cave map they were going in to, so they had a reference on their phone to follow. Got to love technology.
It would be nice if the robot could both fly and crawl. You usually have to crawl before you get to the walking passage.
Here are a few thoughts that would be useful to design into the robot. One would be communications. A big part of a rescue is getting voice communication between the "Incident Commander" and the patient or search team. There is a type of radio that does work underground without wires, but they are expensive to build and not readily available to the normal caver or rescue team. If your robot could both send and receive transmissions, then it could replace the hard wired phones we use along with the team it takes to lay the wire and man them. Being able to both talk to and visually see the person, from outside the cave, (Incident Commander position) when you find them would be huge.
I would think that being able to pick up a heat signature of a person would be very helpful for your robot to search with. Maybe an infrared camera you could remotely monitor with. If the person was unconscious or hiding, this could really help in finding them.
Hope this helps start the discussion.
wangning198914 wrote:trogman wrote:I'm not familiar with the technology that would allow a robot to stick to a cave roof, but my sense is that it wouldn't work very well, mainly due to the non-uniform characteristics of passage roofs. My thinking is that it would be much simpler to make the robot watertight and have it float across any bodies of water it might encounter.
Trogman
Thanks so much for your opinion. I also think about there are some vertical shaft in cave, so I develop my concept and storyboard. What do you think use swarm flying robot to detect the environment of cave?
storyboard
The drone using visible light communication system to contact with surface, and the transmission of lighting signal due to the limit distance of light transmission within 1-2 km. So I'm think about use 4 drones be a group, and there is 1 scanning drone and 3 semaphore drones. When they are out of the signal range, they will land a semaphore drone become a signal box, so the others can flying further. After the drone find the victims, people can interact with drone and tell it their situation.
wangning198914 wrote:What do you think using swarm flying robot? they can work together, and I am thinking there are 4 flying robot be a group, 1 is a scanning and communication drone, and 3 of them are signal transmission drones.they are using visual light communication system to contact with surface. When they are out of range, the 1 of signal transmission drone land on the floor become a signal box that make the others flying further. I also think about using "Bluetooth low energy". Each of caver can wear a smart Bluetooth device. And when the flying robot near them, it can detect the victims and connect with them. it can through 3-5 km. What do you think?
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