Robot and sensor networks for first responders

A network of distributed mobile sensor systems, which can help first responders during emergencies, is discussed. The experiments conducted at a burning building with firefighters show the sensors potential to localize themselves and acquire and combine information providing an integrative view of a dynamically changing environment. In a burning building at a firefighting training facility, a network of stationary Mote sensors, mobile robots with cameras and stationary radio tags are deployed. The long term vision is a physical network that can sense, move, compute and reason, letting network users search for physical information, i.e., information about the location and properties of physical objects in the real world.