IEEE Robotics & Automation Magazine - September 2011 - 116

*
student programs, we are planning
some surprises, so check the official
IROS Web site, http://www.iros2011.
org/, regularly.

Last but not least, we are entering into
an important term in the SAC life, as the
general board elections are approaching.
If you feel the talent and motivation in

yourself, apply to become the next chair
or cochair of the IEEE Robotics and
Automation Society (RAS) SAC (see
"Call for SAC Board 2012-1013").

116

IEEE ROBOTICS & AUTOMATION MAGAZINE

SEPTEMBER 2011

KYOTO UNIVERSITY

ICRA Japan Forum: Preliminary Report on the Disaster and Robotics in Japan
Because of the great interest in the efforts of roboticists to use
robots in the search and rescue and assessment tasks, the
ICRA organizers and leading Japanese researchers organized a
special forum at ICRA to report on these efforts and the challenges and potential for the use of robots in other disasters of
this magnitude.
Two months before ICRA, a very powerful (9.0 in Richter
scale) earthquake struck Japan on 11 March 2011. Less than an
hour after the quake, tsunami waves reached the Fukushima
nuclear plant blacking out the plant by flooding the diesel
backup generators used to cool the fuel. As of mid-May, there
were more than 15,000 deaths and 10,000 missing persons
cases. These were some of the data given by the forum moderator Yoshihiko Nakamura and Chair Hajime Asama, both from
the University of Tokyo.
After a briefing by RAS President Kazuhiro Kosuge, whose
university was also affected by the quake, Dr. Nakamura introduced the Robotics Task Force for Anti-Disaster (ROBOTAD)
that organized the forum. The forum was the opportunity for
ROBOTAD to offer thanks for the world-wide support to get to
be known among the other researchers and discuss the
future. This community of volunteers was founded by 25
people less than a month after the earthquake, and one of its
goals is to help.
The Remote Control/Robotics project team was established by the government and Tokyo Electric Power Company
(TEPCO, the owner of the nuclear plant). The chair of
ROBOTAD, Hajime Asama, a member of the project team,
introduced the team, detailing some of the missions and
tasks to be accomplished. These include decommission and
reduction of the radiation in the former case and debris
removal and surveillance inside the building in the latter case.
One of the biggest problems after beginning the use of robots
in the management of this catastrophe was the dynamical
aspect of environments. Indeed, the tasks to be performed
were changing continuously, and this required thorough discussions to decide on a case-by-case basis which robot
should be used in each specific situation. Prof. Asama also
gave some examples of robots that were built before the
disaster and that were not helpful due to their lack of maintenance or the fact that they were products of basic research
and thus prototypes.
The next speaker was the president of the International Rescue System Institute (IRSI), Prof. Satoshi Tadokoro. Prof. Tadokoro is also a cofounder of the IEEE RAS Technical Committee
on Safety, Security, and Rescue Robotics. After introducing IRSI,
he described the activities that IRSI developed in the context of
the earthquake, which included the Sendai airport inspection,
several port inspections, and activities at the Fukushima
nuclear plant. The Quince robot was used at the nuclear plant
and in the future, it is expected to have missions with two
Quince robots to explore the taller floors. The idea is to have a
wired connection for one of the robots while the other climbs
more stairs and communicates wirelessly with the first one.

KOHGA3 ground robot during a test.
Some of the activities of IRSI were done in conjunction with
the Center for Robot-Assisted Search and Rescue that was introduced by General Director Prof. Robin Murphy. Prof. Murphy
gave an overview of the U.S. robots used in the effort. These
included terrestrial robots such as Packbots and Warriors from
iRobot; Talon, Bobcat, and Dragon runner from Qinetiq; aerial
robots such as T-Hawk from Honeywell; and underwater robots
such as SARbot and Little Benthic Vehicle (LBV)-300 from Seabotix, a Seamor owned by the Center for Ocean Technology of
the University of South Florida and Access ac-remotely operated
vehicle (AC-ROV) from Applied Environmental and Ocean Sciences (AEOS). The first ones were used for inspecting the
nuclear plant and to remove debris while the T-Hawk performed ten flights on the top of the damaged reactors. One of
the aspects focused by Prof. Murphy was the fact that, most of
the time, two robots were needed: one to obtain situation
awareness and another to operate effectively. Another issue
raised was the need to adapt robots that were originally built for
other applications (military and construction).
These kinds of robots have a market that has to be created
and pushed by the public institutions, which does not always
happen. For instance, according to the last speaker, Prof. Fumitoshi Matsuno, the vice president of IRSI, there was no official
request for the use of robots for some time after the quake,
which made IRSI begin doing their activities on their own.
On the other hand, there were many requests from municipalities and port authorities to inspect ports and flooded areas.
Indeed, the underwater robots (and others) were used to
inspect several ports, both to assess the damages and search
for dead bodies (e.g., the team of Prof. Tamaki Ura from the
University of Tokyo found two dead bodies). It is through these
kinds of activities that robots fit the motto of ICRA 2011 "Better
Robots, Better Life," and that should drive more interest
toward this area in the future.
Fausto Ferreira

http://www.iros2011

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Robotics & Automation Magazine - September 2011