Marines test Spot, a robotic dog, in simulated combat situations
A more advanced robotic dog than in the past, Spot is lighter and more agile for stealth missions
By Rachel Engel
M1 Staff
This week the Marines began training with a new kind of ally: Spot, a walking robot.
Created by Boston Dynamics, and owned by Google, Spot was taken to the Marine Corps Base in Quantico, Virginia, where it worked side-by-side with infantrymen in a number of situations and on varying terrain to determine how it would best suit the needs of troops.
Ben Swilling, a member of the team from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) that oversees Spot was confident in the robot's abilities to assist U.S. troops.
“I think a robot like Spot has tons of opportunities we could use it for, like scouting or load carriage,” Swilling said.
The robot can be controlled from up to 500 meters away, and is lighter and quieter than other robotics systems the military has tested, including another Boston Dynamics invention, the BigDog quadruped robot.
"Spot is great and has exceeded the metrics that we’ve provided," Captain James Pineiro, head of the Marine Corps Warfighting Lab's Quantico branch, told a Defense Media Activity reporter covering the tests. "The Marines [working with Spot] have been very receptive to the new technology, embrace it and came up with new ideas we couldn’t even dream up. We see it as a great potential for the future dismounted infantry. We want to continue to experiment with quadruped technology and find ways that this can be employed to enhance the Marine Corps warfighting capabilties."
During an urban combat drill, Spot was sent ahead to look for threats, which would take the place of human being or live dog in a real situation.
http://www.military1.com/robots/article/1546717014-marines-test-spot-a-robotic-dog-in-simulated-combat-situations
