Mock-up of the exhaust shaft inspection by dexterous hexrotor at the DOE WIPP site

Abstract

This report presents a robotic inspection and cleanup task in a nuclear waste storage facility. In February 2014, the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP), a storage facility for high-level nuclear waste located deep underground, experienced a chemically-induced energetic incident within one of its storage containers that resulted in the release of a small amount of radioactive material. This closed the facility for clean-up and the exhaust shaft is the greatest remaining technical challenge. In this report, We introduce the exhaust shaft problem and the proposed solution of using holonomic aerial platforms such as Dexterous Hexrotor and the newly announced platform from CyPhy Works. We present preliminary prototype flight test in a grain silo to mock-up the exhaust shaft inspection task.