EURATHLON: Support Action for a Targeted Intelligent Autonomous Robotic Contest: The European RoboAthlon

euRathlon is a new outdoor robotics competition, which will invite participating teams to test the intelligence and autonomy of their robots in realistic simulated emergency response scenarios. Inspired by the 2011 Fukushima accident, the euRathlon competition will require a team of ground, marine and aerial robots to work together to survey the scene, collect environmental data and identify critical hazards. Prior to this “grand challenge” in 2015, a land-based and an undearwater competition will be held in 2013 and 2014, respectively.

euRathlon competitions will be supported by annual workshops for competitors. In parallel there will be an open standards development process to enable the comparison of different robots in the EUROATHLON competitions. Linked public participation activities will connect EUROATHLON with robotics research, industry and emergency services, as well as the general public. Spectator attendance will be welcome, and euRathlon events are expected to attract considerable press and media attention. By addressing a concrete and urgent need – intelligent robots for disaster response – euRathlon will provide European robotics with a platform for an increasingly challenging, widespread and visible European cognitive robotics technology.