Design and implementation of a semi-autonomous mobile search and rescue robot: SALVOR

Humankind encounters with unprecedented number and scales of disasters which stem from natural and human-made causes. So many victims have suffered severely in those catastrophes that compelled generation and development of search and rescue technology to help victims in future. One of the most important application areas within this scope is the search and rescue robots. The robots equipped with capabilities of sensing and maneuvering in the areas of calamity are enticing more and more attentions from researchers and rescuers. This project aims at realization of a new generation of search and rescue robot which can work in autonomous and semi-autonomous modes and can be used in harsh physical environments of disaster regions to carry out the given tasks more effectively by the use of advanced and economic sensors. In this paper, a mobile search and rescue robot called SALVOR is designed and implemented. SALVOR partly relies on the data from its sensors about the environment and partly on instructions from the human operators for its operation. On the other hand it provides information about its surroundings for situation assessment. Design and implementation processes of SALVOR are described and its test results are presented in an arena which simulates the calamity zone.