Tele-operation through apertures: Pass-ability vs. drive-ability

Urban search and rescue (USAR) robots get stuck. Furthermore, USAR workers complained that it is difficult to judge whether a teleoperated robot can go through certain apertures. Two experiments tested teleoperators’ abilities to (a) judge whether a robot could fit through apertures (passability), (b) judge whether they could drive a robot through apertures (driveability), and (c) drive the robot through apertures. Experiment 1 examined teleoperators’ passability judgments and whether those same operators hit apertures that were wider than the robot. Experiment 2 replicated Experiment 1 and examined driveability judgments. Experiment 1 indicated that teleoperators made accurate passability judgments and routinely hit apertures that were wider than the robot. Experiment 2 successfully replicated Experiment 1 and demonstrated that teleoperators did not make accurate driveability judgments. Experiment 1 indicated that teleoperating a robot through an aperture is constrained by the robots