Marrying Robots

I was over at the Dwarf's site yesterday, looking at some of his recommended blogs. I surfed over to Bayou Renaissance Man's internet abode, when I came across this post. For those of you too lazy click a link, the post gives another link that leads to a story about an EOD tech that got really attached to his robot, Scooby Doo. Peter (Bayou Renaissance Man) asked his readers if anyone had any experience with EOD doing this type of thing to robots. Well, being a veteran of Iraq and EOD, I had to comment. The answer is, "Yes, of course we do." As I said in my comment over there, the robot is a member of our team. Sure, it's only a piece of equipment, but we do tend to get attached. It's the piece of equipment that I can point to and definitively say that it saved my life. Arguably, any equipment that does its job in combat has the potential to save lives. But our bots, now there are machines that do it directly. Let me put it this way: for every robot that "dies" in the direct line of duty, there are lives saved. For every robot blown up by the bad guys, that's one less human tech to get the same thing, one less EOD wife becoming an EOD widow. As I said in that comment, I have had 4 robots go down like that while I was operating them. That's 4 times that my wife, or the wives of my team members/team leader, didn't have to receive a folded flag from an NCO or Officer. So, yeah, we tend to get attached, which tends to lead to anthropomorphizing our robots. As I mentioned in the comment, we would name them, track and record their "personalities" (I swear, dude, that bot is evil! Let's turn it in and draw another....), even keep track of them after we turn them over to replacing teams.

Well, Peter must have liked my comment, for after I posted it, he came out with this rebuttal, in which he asks me to tell some stories about robots. Well, Peter, okay. You asked for it. Here goes.

The first one is about one of the few bots that we had that we had actually named. Her name was Christine. She was a Talon robot (I'm too lazy to add a hyperlink here with a photo. Look it up yourself.) We inherited her from the team that we replaced in the area, and it was them that had named her. "Christine?" we asked. "Like the car?" "Exactly like the car," they said. "She's got a mind of her own, and she can be fickle." "Sure she can," we said, raising eyebrows of dubiousness. Well, we were to eat those words. A short time after that, we were using her to do a little demonstration in our compound for a visiting Colonel, who also happened to be the FOB commander, and the commander of the brigade we were supporting. Well Christine was doing fine, and the Colonel seamed pleased with what we had shown him thus far. Until Christine decided that she really REALLY liked the Colonel, especially his leg. Because she took off on her own, ignoring our commands from the control box, and climbed his leg. Now, Talons are machines with large-ish tracks weighing 90 pounds or more, so climbing people could be dangerous for the person being climbed. Luckily, the Colonel saw us trying to prevent the incident, and he wasn't hurt, so he never said another word about it. We took Christine to the robot shop on Camp Vicotry, who looked her over and told us nothing was wrong with her (in fact, they rather impolitely told us that the problems we were describing were impossible). She was returned to service. One day, not long later, (mind you, we had used her with no problems in the interim) we were working, and we sent Christine down on a suspect item. Well, she started going fine, but then she must have decided that there was something that she didn't like down range, for she turned about 45 degrees out of true, and took off like a shot. Full speed, even though I had the speed knob most of the way down. So, about 15 miles an hour or so. Right into a wall. Which she tried to climb. She ended up flipping over. Even then, her tracks kept spinning as fast as they could. Before she got to the wall and terminated her flight prematurely, I tried everything I could to stop her. Nothing worked. She ignored my commands, and even kept going when I switched off the control unit, which should throw the tracks into full stop. Should, but didn't. As I said, she ended up up-side-down, futilely spinning her tracks in the air, kind of like a dying cockroach. Well, we couldn't get her right away (she was too far down range by this time, and I'm not excited about going out there before I can clear it), so we sent the spare bot, a Packbot (again, look it up yourself). Well, as the packbot got to the item, I moved to brush some trash away with the grippers, and the item detonated, killing the poor Packbot. Maybe Christine sensed what was coming and just didn't want to die? Anyways, we took her back to the robot shop. Now, for those that have been to Camp Victory, they know that there are several lakes there. Well, the robot shop was on the shores of one of the larger and deeper ones. We pulled her out of the truck and explained the problem. Again, we were told that this was impossible. The civilian robotics specialist knelt next to her, attached her battery, and turned her on. She made him eat his words with a side of humble pie. As she took off, again like a hyperactive monkey out of a box, she took a chunk of his thumb with her. Straight across the street, up the berm separating the lake from the road (which was shaped, conveniently, like one of Knievel's launch ramps), about five feet into the air, coming down with a large splash into the lake. "Well," said the tech-rep, as he was trying to stop his thumb from bleeding, "I guess we'll get you a new bot." As a side note, when the diver that they sent after her had found her, she was another 25 meters from where she touched down, bogged in weeds. Apparently, she had kept up her flight across the bottom before getting stuck and dying. Like I say, personalities.

Now, the second and final robot story (for this post) is the one that Peter specifically asked for. On my second deployment, we had a commander that, as we put it then, bent over backward to get us bent over forward. Use your imagination. Suffice it to say that he wasn't very good, and never seemed to be looking out for us, just what other people in the area thought of him. Anyways, he had come over to the base that we were at (we were "fragged out" meaning we were separate from the rest of the company). He made the trip just to break the bad news that he couldn't get us the 4 day passes to Qatar that the rest of the company was getting, which we had also been promised. Sorry. *coughs* A**hole *coughs*. Anyways, after he had told us that, my team member and I had to go make sure the robots were still checking out (something we did everyday). It was the wet season, therefore very muddy, and since part of checking the bots is to clean them, we figured doing it in the mud was dumb. So we brought them in. Now, we had a multi-purpose room. It was part day room, part evidence room. Being our day room, it's where we kept stuff that people would send us in packages, like toys to pass out to kids. Being our evidence room, it's also where we kept things like white construction paper, for the background of photos. Anyway, we were done with checking the bots and were now just kind of messing around. There was a stuffed bear that was a bride bear, it had a veil and bouquet and everything. I grabbed the bouquet and put it in the grippers of the packbot, and put the veil over the main camera. We started laughing like Beevis and Butthead (mature, I know). Well, not to be outdone, my team member grabbed a sheet of construction paper and used electrical tape to make it a top hat. With the black tape, it looked like a white hat with a black band, very snazzy. This he put on to the Talon's main camera. Still giggling like little boys, we positioned several of the other bears as if they were attending a wedding. We controlled our laughing long enough for us to assume somber looks. "Deeeeearly Beloved," my team member, who was standing in the place of the "minister" said. It was then that we heard the door open. We also heard the sound of someone coming to a literal screeching halt on the tile floor. We turned and saw our douchebag commander. He looked at us, we looked at him, he looked at the bots, blinked, performed a perfect about-face, and left, slamming the door. Not long after that, we were all called back in to talk to the CO again. "Well," he told us," I made a few calls and I got your passes to Qatar back. You two," he pointed at my team member and myself, "are going first." And that is how anthropomorphizing robots got me a 4 day pass in Qatar.

Errands

Most people have probably heard of the false things to tell is wrong with their vehicle like blinker fluid and bumper bearings. Well, in the military, we have a similar version of that. Only we tend to do it to new guys in the form of sending them on errands to find these things. Here are a few things that I've seen, been sent for, or most commonly, just heard about.

First: Chemlight batteries. For anyone not in the military, chemlight is jargon for glow sticks, those little sticks you crack, shake, and take to raves. They work by a chemical (hence: chem) reaction when you break a little glass ampule and it mixes with the rest of the fluid. I'm not sure of the exact chamicals, but it's all sciency and stuff. Anyways, they work, and not with batteries. It's common to send a new guy in search of them, usually to the supply section or even the Post Exchange. Mostly it's to razz the poor, inexperienced noobs, but it can be used to just get them out of a junior leader's hair for a while. Actually, a friend of mine was sent after these when he got to his first duty station. He's a bit more intelligent than most people, including his then-new squad leader. And this squad leader was also a douche. It was part of his intent to not only razz my friend, but to probably punish him for the inevitiable failure AND by taking up so much time. My friend figured this, and went straight to the PX, picking up a box of real chem lights, on the way home. Then he spent about 20 minutes finishing his plan, and then he promptly took a nap and enjoyed not being at work. The next day, his squad leader and his platoon sergeant (his squad leader's boss) verbally jumped him and demanded to know where he was the prevois day. He assumed his best parade rest and informed them that he had been out procurring the requested chem light batteries. The squad leader smirked and told him that he had better produce them, or he was in even more trouble. My friend then pulled out what he had been doing for those 20 minutes: the glass vials from inside the chem lights. He had cut them up and removed the "power source" for the chem lights. The platoon sergeant thought that this was so funny that he wouldn't let the squad leader punish my friend. My friend was eventually promoted to squad leader and took over another section, while the douche bag that he turned the tables on pretty much stayed stagnant for the rest of his career. Moral: don't be a douche.

Second: Grid squares. For anyone who's not familiar with any form of orienteering or map reading, grid squares are those little sections drawn on the map for determining coordinates. It's common for junior leaders to send young soldiers to pick up a box of them. A friend of mine thought he would be cute when he got sent for them and cut up a map along the grid lines, but instead he just got in trouble for cutting up a GTA, or graphic training aid. Not too much came of it, though, they made him do some exercises and sent him on his way.

Third: Rotor wash. There seems to be an inordinate amount of these things in the aviation corps. Basically, rotor wash is the wind that comes off of a helicopter's rotors. It's just air moved by the rapid rotation of the rotors, and there is no use for it, and it cannot be collected anyways. It's common for young soldiers to be sent looking for a bucket of rotor wash. Once, while in Iraq, I was flying out to go on leave and was waiting with my gear near the flight line. Every time a helicopter would come in, a young private, in full body armor and kevlar helmet, would get up with an old, metal bucket, and hold hit out under the the down draft of the rotors. After the helicopter would lift off again, she would look in her bucket, swear, and go sit back down. After observing this for a while, I fianlly asked her what was up. she told me she had just got to Iraq and had reported to her section, and been sent for rotor wash. she told me she searched high and low, even in the cleaning supplies (I guess she thought it was for actually washing rotors), but never found any. A kind, passing Sergeant informed her what rotor wahs reall was, no doubt simply trying to help this poor girl get back to productive work. She freel admitted that she then asked this Sergeant if she could just collect it herself, to avoid getting in trouble. I'm sure he did a literal face palm at her stupidity, but he did tell her, probably out of frustration, that yes, she could. But, he said, that she had to do it full battle rattle (armor, kevlar, etc.), and it would undoubtably take a while so she should keep hydrated. At least he through this last part in to keep the girl from falling out from heat stroke....

Fourth: Flight Line. I've heard it common for people to be sent for a hundred yards of flight line. Flight line is just a term used to describe where the planes and helicopters are kept/maintained, not any kind of real rope or line. I've never seen or experienced an instance of this, but I'm informed by friends in aviation that this is a common errand.

Fifth (and my favorite to actually use on people): The Eye-Dee-Ten-Tee manual. Pronounced just like that. When you get someone in your section that is dumb enough to actually make work harder, it's good to send them on this little errand. For those that have never heard of this, spell it out short hand. I-D-10-T manual. It looks like the word idiot. And it's not a real manual. We had a kid out looking for that all over post (I'm at a VERY small base) once, each department bored enough to simply laugh, tell him they didn't have it, and "politely" send him to another department. We would get phone calls from the various people telling of the kid's progress. This went on all day until someone finally told him that the post commander had checked out the last copy, and our mark should just go ask him for it. He was too intimidated to go to a Colonel's office, so he came back all dejected that he couldn't perform this one task. We told him what it really was, and welcomed him to the unit. We still have fun at his expence, but he's kinda like a little brother so we look out for him, too. He may not be bright, but he sure is motivated....

Lastly: a quick story on this being used on me. We were in Iraq, getting ready ot turn our vehicles over to our replacements, which was one of the last things to be done before we headed home. We were washing the trucks. Someone told me to go ask the 1SG for some turtle wax. I know that Turtle Wax is a brand of car wax, and I know very well that you don't normally "wax" tactical vehicles. But I was also aware of the oft fickle 1SG who would have us do really pointless and stupid tasks for no reason, so it was not a stretch for me to imagine him wanting us to wax the vehicles. When I asked for some, he asked why. Not thinking, I told him. He ended up smoking (making us to exercises) both me and the guy that sent me on the errand for about two hours. At least we got out of cleaning the trucks....