Headless, dog-sized robot to patrol Alaska airport to prevent bird strikes
news.sky.com
news.sky.com
So as I see it, this is like a fancy all-terrain Roomba. They dress it up like a Fox or Coyote and it wanders around and patrols the airport grounds, scaring away birds and generally preventing them from nesting in the area. Birds aren't going to nest in areas with active predators. So if this looks like an active predator making constant patrols, then birds will just go somewhere else to roost.
Ultimately it saves the birds from being killed by planes or euthanized by other means. They are not harmed with this patrolling robo-fox, it just adds intimidation factor.
Presumably, the robot will also be smarter than a Roomba and would know to avoid running onto the runway or other critical areas.
I have to carefully track them to figure out which nests belong to mockingbirds and which ones belong to pigeons so I can chase the former away and let the latter do their thing.
The term "pigeon" refers to the whole Columbidae family with over 300 birds so YMMV. Mine are specifically mourning doves which are different from the pigeons I associate with cities (feral domesticated rock doves)
In this case could be geese, which seem more cautious (then again if it's corvids, they'll probably figure out how to reprogram the robot).
not joking. Dogs can be trained. Coyotes… just set up some feeding pens full of carrion at either side of the airport, and set up some doors that open at intervals (there, scratched that robot itch).
Dogs are incredibly stupid, they like to step in front of moving vehicles. Very bad for airport runways...
Airport bird dogs are already a thing. Seems like a dream job for a dog.
But you need a full-time handler, a car, a kennel, training and eventually a replacement. They can’t work 24/7, and if they are out sick for a day the birds are back. Essentially the argument for any kind of automation.
This comment is like looking at a scarecrow, and saying “why not just go and stand out in your field all day?”
And feeding wild coyotes unlimited food, near people, comes with its own set of problems.
You especially don't want to be the person responsible for a dog-strike. Don't mess with the FAA nor the SPCA nor the unions.
https://www.adn.com/alaska-news/2024/03/27/alaskas-new-robot...
Granted, this does appear to be the test phase, but I'd hope there be some evidence this might work before they spend money on it.
Birds are surprisingly smart and they lean very quickly.
A company sells their product for money to a government agency, and somehow this makes them "surprisingly desperate". Dude, they're not having the robot strip on the weekends as a side gig.
Beautiful.
“Surprisingly desperate” seems to not be coming across as I intended, I meant only that it’s surprising that a product that should sell itself is instead searching for use cases, as weakly evidenced by this article but more strongly evidenced by their many past pivots without significant adoption.
I also did photo journalism in college and these photos are from an AP News photographer. One of the things I learned in journalism class is to always try to get a person in your photo, as it helps humanize the story. So it may be an autonomous capable robot they showed in R/C mode for journalistic interest.
> photos are from an AP News photographer. One of the things I learned in journalism class is to always try to get a person in your photo, as it helps humanize the story
Interesting, I didn’t know that, thanks for sharing it!
Not enough dog investors pushing dog-tech hype though. It is a shame though, have you ever read about what their noses can do??