Information presentation method for teleoperated robots to support the multifaceted understanding of fire sites

Abstract

Although the overall number of fires is decreasing, the number of special fires as buildings become larger, taller, and deeper and fires and spills in hazardous materials facilities such as petroleum complexes is on the rise and ensuring the safety of firefighters has become a problem. The use of teleoperated firefighting robots is expected to be a solution to this problem. It is important to be able to operate the robot well, recognize the environment, and make decisions on what actions to take to perform the firefighting more effectively. This is closely related to the design of human machine interface (HMI) for teleoperated robots, but much of the research on HMI for teleoperated robots is concerned with how to operate the robot and how to present the information that is needed for operation. In addition, as the overall number of fires is decreasing, young firefighters' (novices’) lack of experience in firefighting has become a problem. Therefore, teleoperated firefighting robots are required to have the HMI that enables supports to recognize the environment and make decisions in firefighting. This study presents an information presentation method that is based on the control mode in the contextual control model (COCOM) to ensure that novices can have multifaceted perspectives during reconnaissance and attenuation like experienced firefighters (experts). The effectiveness of this method is confirmed by 12 firefighters. As a result, this study confirms that the information presentation is designed considering the control mode in the COCOM, and it improves the score from multiple perspectives. The findings of this study will contribute to the future development of teleoperated firefighting robots.