Space Force takes robot patrol dogs for a walk

U.S. Space Force photo by Senior Airman Samuel Becker

If you happened to be sneaking onto Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in late July, you wouldn't have made it far. Last month, Space Force conducted a demonstration where two robot dogs built by Ghost Robotics conducted patrols in advance of potential broader adoption of the platforms for critical perimeter security.

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The robot dogs are known as Vision 60 Q-UGVs, for quadruped unmanned ground vehicles. Bearing more than a passing similarity to Boston Dynamics' YouTube sensation quadrupeds, they are designed as task agnostic roving sensor platforms capable of detecting a variety of threats. Ghost Robotics describes its Vision 60 model as a "mid-sized high-endurance, agile and durable all-weather ground drone for use in a broad range of unstructured urban and natural environments for defense, homeland and enterprise applications."

The Air Force has also previously tested the platforms for patrol purposes, signaling the broad interest in unmanned systems for routine tasks on U.S. military bases.

Security is just one potential application for these ground drones. Designed as a task-agnostic autonomous platform, robots like Vision 60 and Boston Dynamics' Spot have utility beyond security and defense, extending into areas like pipeline, infrastructure inspection, and search and rescue. Boston Dynamics has already made its signature robot available to businesses and research institutions, where they are used in power generation facilities, factory floors, and construction sites, to name a few.

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