Robots for relief, firefighting work

IMRs built in-house will be available to local industries, hospitals and offices after a year

The Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunications (MoITT) is developing Intelligent Mobile Robots (IMR) for disaster mitigation and firefighting work.

A senior manager at Ignite, a department of MoITT yesterday said Intelligent Mobile Robots (IMRs) will feature fire detection and extinguishing capabilities, in addition to object detection, target tracking, collision avoidance, group formation movement, and autonomous and manual control.

“Now, we are working on remote-controlled, heavy-duty robots [Explosive Ordnance Disposal and Observation Robot] which would provide enhanced bomb disposal capabilities to EOD teams,” the manager said.

The official, while seeking more funds for the advanced level robot, said the cost of a locally manufactured robot would be around Rs4 million (Dh200,982), while the cost of imported robot is around $400,000 (Dh1.46 million).

Giving further details, the official said the IMRs have been built in-house and would be available for local industries, hospitals and offices after one year, after all tests were completed.

IMRs will be able to execute a mission (for example, object detection in a complex terrain, surveying, trajectory following, etc) by incorporating intelligent techniques and robust control algorithms.

Coming to the rescue

Pakistan experiences a high frequency of accidents and disasters, of multiple natures and magnitudes. These include industrial fires, terrorism, floods and earthquakes.

Due to the ad hoc nature of its industrial set-up and the lack of stringent rules and regulations governing electro-mechanical equipment, accidents are common. The MoITT aims to develop intelligent cooperative firefighting and disaster mitigation mobile robots, which can perform critical operations in such hazardous environments.