Dog and Snake Marsupial Cooperation for Urban Search and Rescue Deployment

One of the many challenges in developing ground response robots for Urban Search and Rescue (USAR) is endowing them with mobility that allows traversal of challenging terrain. In a preliminary study we introduced a new approach to the mobility problem that utilizes USAR dogs to deliver robots close to human victims in rubble. The results indicated that some search dogs are able to carry a small robot to a victim. This paper extends the original work—this time employing a more capable snake robot. Snake robots have much better maneuverability within rubble than wheeled or tracked robots. Unfortunately they are very slow—making timely rubble traversal a moot point. The premise of this work is that our hybrid system exhibits the advantages of rapid canine mobility with the flexibility and sensing capability of a snake robot.