Alaska's new robotic dog will be used to haze wildlife at the Fairbanks airport
Published in News & Features
The robot, which can be controlled from a tablet or computer or by "scheduled automation," is waterproof but not bulletproof, Marlow said. It can move left, right, forward and backward, "and can even go for a jog as well," he said.
It can navigate through water and snow; can sense objects in its path to avoid collisions; and can communicate remotely with aircraft pilots, he said.
Marlow said he's been asked why the agency doesn't use actual dogs for wildlife mitigation. He said the benefit of a robot is that it can work 24 hours a day without rest or food — and that it can gather usable data of every wildlife encounter with its built-in camera.
"We're really trying to create the airports of the future," he said.
Marlow emphasized that Aurora will always have a human operator.
"We don't plan to let this thing operate autonomously until we have those security parameters in place," Marlow said.
"I think of it as like a Roomba vacuum," he added. "It's not sentient."
(c)2024 the Alaska Dispatch News (Anchorage, Alaska). Visit the Alaska Dispatch News (Anchorage, Alaska) at www.adn.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
Comments