Victim detection system for urban search and rescue based on active network operation

Abstract

A victim detection system is proposed for rescue operations in urban disaster areas. This system consists of autonomous mobile robots and a stationary monitor station connected by a wireless ad hoc network with an active network operation. Robots are instructed to detect victims in a disaster area and send the information to the monitor station through the ad hoc network, and active network operation recovers the communication path breakages that sometimes occur in disaster areas where a conventional recovery scheme for an ad hoc network may not perform well. This additive network operation is executed by autonomous movements of robots which are installed with a behavior algorithm for communication path recovery. The system's performance is examined by a computer simulation for the case of reconnaissance into a distant location, taking into account robot breakdowns.