Researchers from Carnegie Mellon University have delivered on a pledge to fast-track a robotic mine mapping tool (ENR 9/16 p. 50). They recently sent a 1,600-lb robot named 'Groundhog" into a mine closed since the 1920s and displayed its data collection live to several hundred observers at a conference on mine mapping 155 miles away.
The 4-wheeled device used laser scanners to map what it found on a 100-ft trial excursion. "It was in muck that was over the tires. It wasn't swimming, but it was digging through some pretty nasty stuff," says Warren Whittaker, a consultant on the project.