euRathlon is an outdoor robotics competition where teams test the intelligence and autonomy of their robots in realistic mock emergency-response scenarios. On the fifth and last day of euRathlon 2013 competition, visitors saw demonstrations of robots performing different tasks. The winners of the four euRathlon 2013 scenarios were unveiled at the award ceremony in Salinenplatz, in Berchtesgaden.

Watch the Day Five recap video …

Demonstration of Reconnaissance and Disposal of Explosive Devices
The demonstration “Reconnaissance and disposal of explosive devices” was open to the public and held in the Berchtesgaden train station. Attendees standing on the main platform saw three scenarios in which robots are used by police and bomb squads. The teams participating in this demo were ELP, Telerob and Fraunhofer FKIE.

Robots had to find and pick up a bag or suitcase from a locker and deactivate an explosive device, so as to reduce risk for the squad members. In another scenario, the competing robots had to cut a cable belt of explosives. Some robots were faster than others, but all performed well and successfully completed their mission.

Dynamic display demonstrations
Parallel to the demonstration, visitors once again witnessed some teams’ robots be challenged by National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) tests. Visitors also enjoyed product demonstrations from various exhibitors and euRathlon 2013 Sponsors: Cobham plc, ELP GmbH, Geo Systems Inc., OrbiTeam Software GmbH & Co. KG and Saltation GmbH & Co. KG.

euRathlon 2013 winners
The awards ceremony took place in the big marquee located in Salinenplatz.

Frank E. Schneider, head of euRathlon 2013 competition, and Alan Winfield, euRathlon project coordinator, gave the certificates and prizes to the winners.

• Scenario: Mobile for handling hazardous materials.
  1st prize Telerob, 2nd ELP and 3rd SPACEAPPS
• Scenario: Reconnaissance & Surveillance in urban structures (USAR).
  1st prize ELP, 2nd Telerob and 3rd IMM-IAIR
• Scenario: Search & Rescue in smoke-filled underground structure
  1st prize Telerob, 2nd ELP and 3rd ENSTABretagne
• Autonomous navigation
  1st prize MuCAR, 2nd RIS and 3rd NAMT

Additional awards for:

• Novel Scientific Solution: team RIS
• Creative Solution: team NAMT
• Best Team Effort: team E15

Corporate teams ELP (from ELP) and Telerob (from COBHAM) donated their prize money to the first university team on the list of scenario finalists.

At the end of the ceremony, Alan Winfield and Frank E. Schneider thanked the Chief Judge Team, Dr.-Ing. Michael Gustmann, and the judges: Dipl.-Ing. Thomas Zawadke, Prof. Dr. Juha Röning and Kenneth A. Pink.  They also thanked the local organiser Frank Woodcock, CEO of the company ProgenoX, and all the teams and attendees of euRathlon 2013. All of them were invited to participate or attend euRathlon 2014 underwater robotics competition in Italy next year.

See all the euRathlon 2013 coverage.

Clouds, mist and rain accompanied the fourth day of euRathlon 2013 civilian outdoor robotics competition. Thursday was the day when the “Autonomous Navigation” scenario took place in an area of the Kehlstein mountain (1.834 m), located in the Berchtesgaden Alps. Unfortunately teams and robots had to deal with heavy rain. Despite of the poor weather conditions, which are part of a real world scenario, many robots successfully finished two of the three levels of autonomous navigation.
Watch the Day Four recap video …

The 4th Scenario: Autonomous navigation
The “Autonomous navigation” scenario took place in the breathtaking landscape of the Berchtesgaden Alps. The robots had to autonomously navigate an Alpine trail on the Kehlstein mountain. The trail had three levels of difficulty. At the end of the first and second levels, there was a sign that the robot could detect and choose whether or not to continue to the next level. The first-level terrain was gravel and the path was slightly inclined, while the second level had the same type of gravel terrain, but the path was steeper and was scattered with medium-size tree branches. The third-level path was narrow and steep with rocky terrain.

The competing robots had 45 minutes to reach the end of the third level or, if they decided not to traverse that very difficult path, reach the first or second level and come back.

Spectators followed the slower-moving robots as they performed this task, and watched a recording of the faster-moving ones on a big screen once they returned to the starting point.

Despite the poor weather conditions, many robots successfully reached the end of level two. All the robots were fully autonomous and not tele-operated. However, each had a system that allowed the robot operator, who was following the robot next to the judge, to take control of the robot if needed, for example, if the robot was lost, got stuck, or could not navigate. Some robots required human intervention as they performed the task, and were consequently penalized. However, all teams did well bearing in mind the poor weather and the completely unknown terrain.

Of the seven teams initially signed up for this scenario, two withdrew before the competition and the rest qualified for the final. These five teams were: MuCar, ARTOR, RIS, FKIE and NAMT.

In tomorrow’s post, the winners of euRathlon 2013 will be unveiled. Don’t miss it!

See all the euRathlon 2013 coverage.

The sun was shining again on the third day of euRathlon 2013 outdoor robotics competition in Berchtesgaden, Germany. Wednesday was the day for the “Search and rescue in a smoke-filled underground structure” scenario, and the last day of the euRathlon 2013 workshop, where attendees enjoyed presentations by specialists in various areas of robotics. The keynote presentation was given by Shinji Kawatsuma, senior primary engineer of the Japan Atomic Energy Agency, who talked about the lessons learned from using robots in the emergency response disaster of Fukushima Daiichi NPP. Following the presentations was a UAV pilot demonstration carried out by the Center for Advanced Aerospace Technologies (CATEC). Watch the Day Three recap video …

Workshop Day Two
In addition to the keynote, Day Two of the workshop featured more presentations by specialists in the area of robotics:

• Anne Bajart, of the and euRathlon European Commission project officer , “Unmanned vehicles and Horizon 2020”
• Shinji KAWATSUMA, Senior primary engineer of the Japan Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA)
  “Robotic lessons learned in emergency response to Fukushima Daiichi NPP”
• Dr.-Ing. Peer Rechenbach, Senior Expert of Disaster Management, Civil
  Protection, Leadership Organization and CBRN-Measurement.
  “Information needs for decision makers in case of major emergencies – Experiences”
• Martin Hutchings, of the National Bomb Squad Commanders Advisory Board (NSBCAB) “Robots used by police and bomb squads”
• Dr.-Ing Konstantin Kondak, of the DRL (National aeronautics and space research centre of the Federal Republic of Germany)
  “Robotics Technologies for Flying Robots – New applications and challenges”
• Antidio Viguria Jiménez, of CATEC (Center for Advanced Aerospace Technologies) “UAV platform available for teams participating in euRathlon 2015”

Following the presentations, a safety pilot from CATEC, one of the partners of euRathlon consortium, did a UAV pilot demonstration in the garden of the Kongresshaus, and attendees were invited to test their pilot skills.

The 3rd Scenario:  Search and rescue in a smoke-filled underground structure
The scenario “Search and rescue in a smoke-filled underground structure” took place in a tunnel located next to Salinenplazt in Berchtesgaden.  The tunnel entrance was covered with large curtains to keep the inside of the underground structure in darkness and filled with dense smoke.

This scenario required competing robots to enter the tunnel, inspect the area, and search for Objects of Potential Interest (OPI) — ERICard number plates. Debris and objects were scattered across the floor and stacked next to the walls to make navigation more difficult for the robots. The robots were required to build a geometric representation of the tunnel and reference all the OPI detected there. Once the OPIs were referenced and all the data and images reported to the control station, the robot had to leave the tunnel and return to the starting point.

The teams had 30 minutes to find as many OPI as they could and transmit the acquired data to the control station.

Spectators could follow the competition outside the perimeter of the underground scenario. Live camera video and computer screenshots were displayed on a big screen.

The competing robots managed well despite the extremely poor visibility and the debris-covered terrain; however locating all the OPIs in 30 minutes was a difficult challenge.

Of the ten teams participating in this scenario, eight qualified for the final. These eight teams were: ELP, Telerob, Ensta-Bretagne, IMM-IAIR,Robotics Inventions, SCentrRo, Space Applications and E15.

See all the euRathlon 2013 coverage.

The second day of euRathlon competition started with the opening session of the euRathlon 2013 workshop, which was run in parallel with the scenario “Reconnaissance and surveillance in urban structures” (USAR).  The competition continued until the end of the evening, followed by a fire drill performed by the local fire brigades featured in the same building as the USAR scenario.  The fire drill took place simultaneously with an interactive display session of workshop posters in the Salinenplatz marquee. A typical and festive Bavarian dinner was served to teams, workshop delegates and fire fighters at the end of the second day. Watch the Day Two recap video …

Workshop – Day One
The first day of the euRathlon 2013 workshop was held in the Congress Centre “Kur-und Kongresshaus” of Berchtesgdaen, and featured presentations by specialists in the area of robotics for field search-and-rescue:

• Dr.-Ing. Michael Gustmann, “Real-world field robotics: Nuclear emergency response robotics in Germany”
• Thommaso Flamma, “ICARUS Unmanned Search and Rescue”
• Adam Jacoff, “Standard Test Methods for Response Robots: Supporting Objective Evaluations, Procurements, and Operator Training”
• George Kern, “Synthetic Aperture Processing for Deep GNSS/INS Integration”
• Andrzej Typiak , “Development of high mobility platforms for search and rescue missions”
• Prof. Sergey Tsarichenko “Robots of the all-Russian Scientific Research Institute for Fire Protection”
• Dirk Schmidt “BlueBot phone app robot control system”

The 2nd scenario:  Reconnaissance and surveillance in urban structures (USAR)
The Reconnaissance and Surveillance in Urban Structures (USAR) scenario was held in the basement of an old building next to Berchtesgaden train station.

The scenario required competitors’ robots enter to the building and go down the stairs to the basement. Once there, the robots had to inspect the building and search for Objects of Potential Interest (OPI), which, for this scenario were ERICard number plates. While the robots were performing the search task, they had to simultaneously build a geometric representation of the structure and its environment and reference all the OPI detected in it.  All data and images had to be reported to the control station, and live camera video and computer screen shoots were displayed on a big screen outside the building where spectators followed the competition.

The teams had 60 minutes to find as many OPI as they could and transmit the acquired data to the control station.

Going down the stairs was the most difficult task for the six teams that participated in the USAR scenario. Most of the robots used an elevator lift to go to the basement (despite a score penalization for doing so); of those teams that decided to take the stairs, many wound up upside-down on the staircase landing.

The robots were able to find OPIs in very low light conditions, to transmit data and to successfully build a 2-D and 3-D geometric representations of the urban structure.

The six teams that qualified for Friday’s finals were: ELP, Telerob, Space Applications, Robotics Inventions, IMM-IAIR and Fraunhofer FKIE.

Exhibition area
Various companies and organisations have their products and projects on display in the exhibition area this week. On Day Two, exhibition area visitors witnessed how teams had the chance to test their robots in an off-competition testing circuit designed by people from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), USA.

Workshop posters display and social event
In the evening, the exhibition area held an interactive display session of workshop posters and a typical Bavarian dinner, and team members, workshop delegates and fire fighters exchanged ideas and talked about their projects and jobs while having a drink.

See all the euRathlon 2013 coverage.

euRathlon is a new civilian outdoor robotics competition focused on realistic cooperative search and rescue response scenarios. The euRathlon 2013 competition, which takes place this week in Berchtesgaden, Germany, is only for land-based robots. Though there was good weather on the first day of the competition, not all the teams qualified for the finals of the competition’s first scenario: “Mobile manipulation for handling hazardous material.” Watch the Day One recap video…

The Opening
EuRathlon project coordinator Professor Alan Winfield gave a warm welcome to all the attendees, followed by Anne Bajart (the project’s European Comission officer), Dr Frank Schneider (Head of  euRathlon 2013 Land Robotics Competition), and Herr Rudolf Schaupp.

The 1^st Scenario:  Mobile manipulation for handling hazardous material
The competition’s first scenario required competitors’ robots to approach and inspect a tank waggon that was leaking a “hazardous” substance (water was used to simulate the hazardous substance for safety reasons).  The robots were required to stop the liquid from flowing out of the tank by closing at least one of the tank’s many valves, which came in various sizes and shapes. Once the valves were closed, the robots were required to pick up at least one canister containing the “hazardous” substance from a loading platform, move it into a barrel, and then cover the barrel with a lid.  The canisters were of varying sizes and weights, and were located at different heights on the loading platform.  Teams had a maximum of 45 minutes to complete this scenario, and the task was complete when the robot returned to the starting point.

Mobile manipulation is a difficult task, especially if it’s done autonomously. On Monday morning three teams decided to withdraw from this scenario, leaving four teams to participate in the mobile manipulation scenario. All four teams that qualified for the finals on Friday were tele-operated; these are: Space Applications, Telerob, ELP and Fraunhofer FKIE.

Exhibition Area
Various companies and organisations have their products and projects on display in the exhibition area this week. On Day One, exhibition area visitors witnessed an impressive demonstration of the Menzi Muck “Rescue Spider”, a robot used by the German Agency for technical relief (THW) in real disaster-response scenarios. 

Get-Together Event
After a long day of tuning up and fixing robots, participants, visitors, exhibitors and euRathlon organisers met in the Congress Centre “Kur-und Kongresshaus” to relax, enjoy dinner and exchange ideas.

Day Two will be another exciting day, with qualifications for the Urban Search and Rescue (USAR) scenario and the first day of euRathlon 2013 workshop. See all the euRathlon 2013 coverage.

Buildings that are collapsed or on fire, tunnels flooded with smoke or water, unstructured areas subject to radiation, chemical spills or gas leaks … these are the kinds of scenarios that place emergency services personnel at great risk, and where using robots could help contain damage and minimize injury or death. euRathlon is a civilian outdoor robotics competition supported by the European Commission with a focus on realistic cooperative search and rescue response scenarios. Inspired by the 2011 Fukushima accident, the competition scenarios have been carefully designed to provide teams with realistic challenges that test their robot’s ability to face real-world situations. Fourteen teams qualified for the event. We will be providing daily coverage of the competition, which will take place in Berchtesgaden, Germany from September 23-27, 2013.

The scenarios
When designing the event, organizers asked themselves how robots could best be leveraged by emergency services personnel in a disaster scenario: How can robots be monitored from a safe distance, so that human emergency workers can focus on other important tasks? What kinds of tasks could the robots perform? Are robots ready to succeed in real-world environments? And how can we test them?

To help address these questions, the euRathlon 2013 land competition was designed around five scenarios:

1. Reconnaissance and surveillance in urban structures (USAR)
2. Mobile manipulation for handling hazardous material
3. Search and rescue in a smoke-filled underground structure
4. Autonomous navigation using GPS, GLONASS and GALILEO
5. Reconnaissance and disposal of explosive devices

Descriptions of the five scenarios were published in advance of the competition to allow teams to prepare their robots. Detailed descriptions of the scenarios and potential hazards the robots would face were deliberately kept from the teams so as to keep an element of uncertainty, just like in a real world disaster.

Qualifying teams
Successfully tackling the competition scenarios is not an easy task, and prospective teams were required to take part in a qualifying process to prove that their robot(s) would be able to cope with the scenarios. Each team was required to write a Scenario Application Paper (SAP) explaining how their robot(s) would address the technical challenges of the scenarios they were planning to enter. The SAPs were reviewed to see if each team’s proposed solutions were realistic, and feedback from this process was fed back to the teams to help them prepare for the actual land competition. Here are the 14 teams that have qualified for participation in the euRathlon 2013 land competition:

1. ARTOR — ARTOR is a team of researchers and technical staff from the Autonomous Systems Lab (ASL) of ETH Zürich and RUAG Defence. They will participate with their robot, also called “ARTOR” (Autonomous Rough Terrain Outdoor Robot), in the autonomous navigation scenario.
2. E15 — E15 is formed by a group of 16 students from the University of Applied Sciences Esslingen, Germany. Their robot “Monique” will participate in the mobile manipulation, smoke-filled underground and autonomous navigation scenarios.
3. ELP — The ELP team represents German company ELP GmbH and will participate with their robot “PAckBot EOD 510” in the USAR, mobile manipulation, smoke-filled underground and EOD scenarios.
4. ENSTA Bretagne — ENSTA Bretagne is a small team of students and researchers from the Institute of ENSTA Bretagne, France. They will participate with their robot “Tracker” in the smoke-filled underground scenario.
5. Fraunhofer FKIE — The team of the Fraunhofer Institute for Communication, Information Processing and Ergonomics FKIE, Fraunhofer FKIE, will participate in the USAR, mobile manipulation, and autonomous navigation scenarios with their robots: “Telemax”, “TeodorPrime” and “Garm”.
6. IMM-IAIR — IMM-IAIR is a team of researchers of the Institute of Mathematical Machines in collaboration with the Institute of Automatic Control and Robotics, Warsaw, Poland. They will participate with their robot “MSAS II” in the USAR and smoke-filled underground scenarios.
7. MAJIDADA – Allen Vanguard — MAJIDADA is the team of the UK- based company Allen-Vanguard. They will participate in the USAR, mobile manipulation, smoke-filled underground and EOD scenarios with the robots “Defender D2.1”, “Digital Vanguard”, “Scorpion SUGV”, “Armadillo UGV” and “Beetle NUGV”.
8. MuCAR — MuCAR is the team of the University of the Bundeswehr Munich, Germany. The team develops and operates the robot vehicle “MuCAR-3” that will participate in the autonomous navigation scenario.
9. NAMT — The NAMT team is formed by students and staff of two institutions, the Nizhny Novgorod Automotive Technical School (NAMT) and the Moscow State Technical University. They will participate with the robot “CyberMobile” in the autonomous navigation scenario.
10. RIS — RIS is the team of the Laboratory of Analysis and Architecture of Systems (LAAS), a CNRS research unit, based in Toulouse, France. They will participate with the robots “Mana” and “Minnie” in the USAR, smoke-filled underground and autonomous navigation scenarios.
11. RI Spirit – Robotics Inventions — RI Spirit is the team of Polish company Robotics Inventions. They will participate with the robot “A-Bot Light” in the USAR, mobile manipulation, smoke-filled underground and autonomous navigation scenarios.
12. SCentRo — SCentRo is a team of 6 PhD students of the Sheffield Centre for Robotics (SCentRo) that was jointly established by the Sheffield Hallam University and the University of Sheffield, UK.  SCentRo will participate with the robot “PIONEER P3 AT” in the “Search and rescue in smoke filled underground structure” scenario.
13. SPACEAPPS — The SPACEAPPS team is formed by staff of the Belgium company Space Applications Services N.V. They will participate with the robot “MILOU” (Clearpath Husky A200) in USAR, mobile manipulation, smoke-filled underground and EOD scenarios.
14. Telerob — Telerob is the team of the German-based company telerob Gesellschaft für Fernhantierungstechnik mbH trading as Cobham Mission Equipment. They will participate with the robot “Telemax” in the USAR, mobile manipulation, smoke-filled underground and EOD scenarios.

Which robots will successfully address the scenarios? Don’t miss the daily updates next week.

For pictures and more information about the teams visit:    http://www.eurathlon2013.eu/information/competition/participants.html

See all the euRathlon 2013 coverage.

A week ago the DARPA Robotics Challenge unveiled the ATLAS humanoid robot, which will be used by seven competing teams. Developed by Boston Dynamics, ATLAS is an imposing 1.8m 150Kg bipedal humanoid robot, powered via a tethered cable. Another six teams have designed their own robots, and interestingly five of these are humanoid, and one a four-limbed simian-inspired robot.

In the euRathlon project we are taking a different approach in that we don’t expect, or require, the competing robots to be humanoid or zoomorphic. None of the euRathlon competition scenarios demand a humanoid robot to, for example, be able to step inside a vehicle and drive it. However, for the land robots at least, there is nothing stopping euRathlon teams from bringing humanoid robots to the competition.

As I wrote when we launched euRathlon early this year, the big vision of euRathlon is a competition scenario in which no single type of robot is, on its own, sufficient. Inspired by the Fukushima accident of March 2011, the 2015 euRathlon competition will require teams of land, sea and flying robots to autonomously cooperate, survey the scene, identify critical hazards and undertake tasks to make the plant safe. Leading up to this grand challenge in 2015, will be related and preparatory land and underwater robot competitions in 2013 and 2014, respectively.

The difference of our approach is not the result of an in-principle decision. Rather, it flows naturally from several factors. First, we are specifically creating competition scenarios that require cooperating teams across the three domains of land, sea and air. Second, we are looking for very high levels of autonomy, so the robot teams will, ideally, complete their mission with hands-off human monitoring only. Any human interventions will be penalised in the euRathlon scoring schema. And third, we are not looking to push innovation in the robot platforms themselves, but rather in their cognition, autonomy and system level team working. Thus, euRathlon teams who make use of existing and proven robot hardware will gain a big advantage in that they can focus all of their efforts on the software, communications and systems engineering; the AI and the autonomy. And by autonomy we mean both control and energy autonomy. The euRathlon competition scenarios preclude the use of tethered power connections, so robots must carry their own energy supplies sufficient to last the whole mission.

For these reasons the euRathlon robots are likely to look rather conventional: wheeled or tracked land robots; fixed or rotary wing (i.e. quadcopter) flying robots, and ROV-type underwater robots. Not as dramatic as the DARPA robot challenge humanoid or animal-like robots perhaps, but looks can be deceptive: the real innovation in the euRathlon robots will be in the autonomous cooperation across the three domains. Something that has not been demonstrated in realistic outdoor disaster response scenarios.

Of course there is nothing to stop euRathlon teams from using a bio-mimetic approach, so fish-like underwater robot cooperate with bird-like flying robots, and legged animal-like land robots. That really would be something!

Related blog posts:
euRathlon is go! (Feb 2013)
Real-world robotics reality check (May 2010)
A truly Grand Challenge (August 2007)

I’m very excited to be leading a new project called euRathlon – which is short for European Robotics Athlon. Up until now the project has been under wraps, but now – finally – we can go public. I’ll explain a bit more about the process that led to here later in this blog post, but first – about euRathlon.

It is an EU funded project to set up and run a series of outdoor robotics competitions. The focus is robots for search and rescue, or – more broadly – disaster response. Right now robots are not part of the standard equipment of emergency services, like fire brigades. But actually, robotics technology is coming close to the point where they could be and, in my view, should be. It seems to me that first responders should have robots as a standard part of their equipment, so that when there is a disaster robots are used as a matter of routine. euRathlon will, I hope, speed up the development and adoption of smarter robots for first responders.

The big vision of euRathlon is a competition scenario in which no single type of robot is, on its own, sufficient. Inspired by the Fukushima accident of 2011, our Grand Challenge will require teams of land, sea and flying robots to investigate the scene. Here is the project abstract:

euRathlon is a new outdoor robotics competition, which will invite teams to test the intelligence and autonomy of their robots in realistic mock emergency-response scenarios. Inspired by the 2011 Fukushima accident the euRathlon competition will require a team of land, underwater and flying robots to work together to survey the scene, collect environmental data, and identify critical hazards. Leading up to this ‘grand challenge’ in 2015, will be directly related land and underwater robot competitions in 2013 and 2014, respectively. The euRathlon competitions will be supported by annual workshops for competitors. In parallel there will be an open process of developing benchmarks to allow comparison of different robots in the euRathlon competitions. Linked public engagement activities will connect euRathlon with robotics research, industry and emergency services, as well as the general public. Attendance of spectators will be welcomed, and we hope that euRathlon events will attract considerable press and media attention. By targeting a specific and urgent need – intelligent robots for disaster-response -euRathlon will provide European robotics with a platform for challenging, extending and showcasing European cognitive robotics technologies.

Followers of this blog will know that I’ve been involved in the European Land Robotics Challenge (ELROB) for some years. I blogged about it in 2010: Real-world robotics reality check, and in 2007: A truly Grand Challenge. So, when the EU Framework Programme (FP7) issued a call for competition proposals late in 2011 an opportunity arose for those of us involved in ELROB to think about bidding for a new competition, building on that experience and extending our ambition. We were very fortunate to link up with the organisers of the Student Autonomous Underwater Challenge – Europe (SAUC-E), a very well regarded underwater robot competition. We then had land and sea robots covered. The final piece of the jigsaw fell into place when we were joined by our final partner, organisers of the workshop on Research, Development and Education on Unmanned Aerial Systems (RED-UAS 2011), with huge experience of aerial robots.

The euRathlon consortium was complete, and together we submitted our bid in April 2012. Following evaluation the bid was successful and then, from September to December 2012, we went into a phase of project negotiation, in which we worked out and agreed the details of the project with the EC. That process concluded successfully, and the project started on 1 January 2013.

So now, euRathlon is go!