Original Source: The Odessa Journal

Four teams of developers have already tested their robotic mowers at a training ground as part of the “Safe Field” hackathon. These mowers are designed to help sappers work more efficiently in fields with thick grass and shrubs.

(Sapper: a soldier responsible for tasks such as building and repairing roads and bridges, laying and clearing mines, etc)

Sappers need remote-controlled, inexpensive mowers to de-mine our territories faster and more safely.

“A trained sapper should work with a mine detector and a probe, not cut grass and bushes manually until they have blisters on their fingers. What a machine can do safely, a machine should do, not a person,” said Ihor Bezkraivainyi, Deputy Minister of Economy of Ukraine, the initiator of the hackathon.

The showcased developments included robotic tractors, multi-platforms, and more.

During the trials at the training ground, each team had a specific time to mow a designated area. The jury evaluated the power of the machines, the autonomy of their operation, the quality of navigation and remote control, the ability to overcome obstacles, and the height of the cut vegetation.

The first stage of the hackathon took place on May 25, during which the development teams presented their concepts. The task was to create robotic mowers capable of efficiently cutting grass and being inexpensive to produce so that in the event of a mine explosion, such a machine could be quickly replaced. The prices for the projects presented by the developers ranged from $5,500 to $19,500 per unit.