Revised Summary Reader Response

 The article "Firefighting robots go autonomous" by Little (2021) discuss the capabilities of these particular robots and their benefits. With more than 350,000 American homes burning annually and climate change contributing to 10,000 active daily wildfire worldwide, firefighters need an alternative solution to put out the fires effectively. Robots are able to offer some respite to firefighters entering blazing building or traversing steep mountains. Over 3000 Americans die from fires annually, which includes an average of 80 firefighters (Little, 2021). With technological advancements, firefighters are now equipped with robots to aid their work. The U.S. Forest Service have been seen using "remote controlled firefighting technology" to aid in their effort to reduce forest fires. The company have been testing and using remote controlled airdrop spheres call "dragon eggs", these "eggs" are filled with potassium permanganate and glycol, and has the ability to keep the forest fuels at a more balance levels (Little, 2021). In the article, Little discusses in detail the RS3 used by the Los Angeles Fire Department and goes through briefly about the firefighting drone. I believe that the flight capabilities and the enhanced mapping system of the firefighting drone would have a greater impact in the efficiency of firefighting than the current methods they are using, while putting them at a lower risk of injury or death.

One of the ways that firefighting drones are able to increase the efficiency of firefighting is through being able to scale elevated places faster than the methods that are being used now by firefighters. Firefighters are required to fight wildfires on steep hills, they are required to scale the forested hill to the fire while carrying all their gear while fighting with the adverse weather conditions. "The biggest challenges we face now are the strong winds and high temperature. Also, the mountains are steep for firemen to climb up"(Yang, Fang & Zhang, 2020). These factors cause the firefighters to take a longer time to reach the locality and they will be faced with fatigue once they have begun fighting the fire. In order to tackle this issue, various researchers have conceptualised the idea of using swarms of autonomous drones capable of carrying a payload of 5 to 50 kilograms each. These drones would then fly in a grid formation to strategically put out the fire. Not only are the drones able to scale up the steep areas but they can also be instantly deployed during the day or night due to the using a relocatable platform without requiring a nearby water source. In contrast to the air/rotorcrafts of airborne firefighters, these drones do not put the user's life at risk as they are fully autonomous (Ausonio et al, 2021).

The other ways which these drones are able to aid the firefighters to be more efficient in their work is by improving their visibility. Currently, firefighters are limited to what they can see and information is being transmitted to them via radio from the headquarters (Spell, 2019). This causes a delay in their fight against fire as they are unable to get real-time updates. However, this will soon change as the drones that are being tested have "hazard mapping systems" that can give them "trusted information in real time", explained Andy Henson, Vice President of artificial intelligence at Science Applications International Corp (Fialka, 2022). In addition, Balch et al.(2022), suggested that in regards to tens of thousands of wildfires around the world, night time fires have increased by 7.2 percent since 2003. In the U.S., the rise has been 28 percent. Due to global warming, the temperature rises during the night, which reduces the moisture level the night air could previously hold, and this effect was known as the "Vapour Pressure Deficit". This effect will cause more wildfires to ignite during the night (Nolan et al, 2016).

However, there has been a major concern about utilising robots to fight fire. One of the main limitations is the cost of developing such robot which specialises in emergency operations. The cost for these roots is from "$500 to $30,000 or more" (Anderson, n.d.). This is due to their enhanced specifications, which include, being weather and fire resistant, the maintenance cost, insurance and sensors (Radu et al, 2019). In addition to that, users would then have to go through a drone program to get used to the function of the drone, the average cost of a drone program would cost around $35,000 to $40,000 (Anderson n.d.).

In conclusion, firefighting drones increase the efficiency of firefighters. Not only able to aid the firefighters to have better visibility in the dark and able to scale places with fire faster than conventional methods. Notedly, one of the obstacles faced is the cost. However the pros outweigh the cons by a landslide, proving that the firefighting drones have a greater impact in the efficiency of firefighting than the current methods that firefighter are using.

 

References

Ausonio, E., Bagnerini, P. & Ghio, M. (2022) Drone Swarms in fire suppression Activities: A Conceptal Framework. https://www.mdpi.com/2504-446X/5/1/17#cite

Anderson, L. (n.d) How fire department use drones to save lives. The big red guide. https://skyfireconsulting.com/how-fire-departments-use-drones-to-save-lives/

Balch, J., Abatzoglou, j., Joseph, M., Koontz, M., Mahmood, A., McGlinchy, L., Cattails, M., & Willams, A.(2022). Warming weakens the night-time barrier to gloval fire.nature,602,442-448. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-021-04325-1 

Fialka, J.(2022). Wildfires on the rise, but new tech could help in the fight.E&R News. https://www.eenews.net/articles/wildfires-on-the-rise-but-new-tech-could-help-in-the-fight/

Spell, J. (2019). A firefighter's guide to communicating via two-way portable radios. Fire Rescue. https://www.firerescue1.com/fire-products/communications/radios/articles/a-firefighters-guide-to-communicating-via-two-way-portable-radios-w7HsUVneNKPZh0Fu/

Little, J.B. (2021) Firefighting robots go autonomous. Scientific Amrican. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/firefighting-robots-go-autonomous/

Nolan, R. H., Resco de Dios, V., Boer, M. M., Caccamo, G., Goulden, M. L., & Bradstock, R. A.(2016). Predicting dead fine fuel moisture at regional scales using vapour pressure deficit from MODIS and gridded weather data. Remote Sensing of Environment, 174, 100-108. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rse.2015.12.010

Vlad, T. R., Ander, S. K. & Saqib, M. (2019).Use of drones for firefighting operations. https://projekter.aau.dk/projekter/files/294663864/Master_Thesis__Vlad_Tiberiu_Radu__RISK4_11.pdf

Yang, Z., Fang, Z. & Zhang, K.(2022). Efforts to fight forest fire continue in SW China. NewsCGTN. https://news.cgtn.com/news/2020-04-02/Efforts-to-fight-forest-fire-continue-in-SW-China-