Sensor fusion based seek-and-find fire algorithm for intelligent firefighting robot

Finding a fire fast is crucial in firefighting. For risky situations, it would be idealistic to send a firefighting robot that could quickly and efficiently find the fire and suppress it. This paper introduces an algorithm developed for an intelligent firefighting mobile robot to find a fire efficiently by fusing long wave infrared camera, ultraviolet radiation sensor, and LIDAR. For its validation, an experimental test-bed was constructed with a hallway and two rooms, with one of the rooms containing a real size fire created by propane gas. The robot immediately calculates its path towards the fire, moves towards it avoiding obstacles, and ultimately finds the fire. When the fire is out, the robot returns to its original starting place.