BY CHRIS LAVERS
The US Air Force (USAF) at Tyndall has just announced the arrival of its first official semi-autonomous robot dogs to its Air Force Base (AFB) in Florida, for establishment patrols [1]. Such quad-legged unmanned ground vehicles (Q-UGVs) are now being integrated into the 325th Security Forces Squadron’s daily activities. This particular quad platform was designed by Philadelphia-based Ghost Robotics and Immersive Wisdom (https://www.ghostrobotics.io/) and its robot dogs are the ‘first of their kind’ to be fully integrated onto a military installation. Ghost has partnered with companies big and small to build cutting-edge solutions addressing defence, homeland security, and enterprise customer needs, and leveraging the latest in both sensors and telecommunications hardware, as well as operational and autonomy applications and AI. Their semi-autonomous robot dogs can operate over a broad temperature range from -40° F to 131° F, they have fourteen different sensors, and can provide 360° situational awareness. These robot dogs feature a number of operational modes, a ‘crouch mode’ to decrease its ‘centre-of-gravity’, a high-step mode to adjust individual leg mobility, and several other features that allow for simple platform navigation on difficult terrain.
Tyndall AFB Program Management Office security forces Programme Manager Mark Shackley says: ‘As a mobile sensor platform, the Q-UGVs will significantly increase situational awareness for defenders. They can patrol the remote areas of a base while defenders can continue to patrol and monitor other critical areas of an installation.’ Robot dog deployment in March follows last November’s USAF press announcement that Tyndall AFB would shortly deploy semi-autonomous robot dogs into their patrolling regiment [2].
Such platforms can now provide specific non-human routine patrolling advantages, especially in adverse environmental conditions, and they can patrol the remote areas of any military base whilst defenders can continue to patrol and monitor other more important critical areas of an installation. According to Support Superintendent Master Sergeant Krystoffer Miller ‘Tyndall (AFB) is a perfect test base as it was deemed ‘The Installation of the Future’’. Certainly a big attraction of such Quad robot dogs is they are highly mobile and will help the maintain and increase the USAF security posture.
[1] USAF Tyndall Air force Base receives semi-autonomous robot dogs
https://www.airforce-technology.com/news/usaf-tyndall-air-force-base-receives-semi-autonomous-robot-dogs/ 30 March 2021
[2] USAF’s Tyndall AFB to deploy semi-autonomous robot dogs https://www.airforce-technology.com/news/usafs-tyndall-afb-to-deploy-semi-autonomous-robot-dogs/ 16 November 2020.