Although over time perpetrators likely will have mobile EMP generators to fry the robot's electronics with an electromagnetic pulse. Even then by changing the wiring and a few microchips most robots would be functional soon once again.
Also, I read that it only cost 8000 dollars somewhere. However, it says below here it actually costs about 151,000 dollars which might be like buying a plane, a drone or a helicopter or an armored truck more than anything else. So, only the larger police municipalities are likely to have something like this. But, you could also see them loaning theirs to smaller areas to save lives too.
begin quote from:
Meet the Remotec Andros Mark V-A1, the robot that killed the Dallas shooter
Now, Dallas police have released additional details about the technology it used to end the standoff.
On Saturday, authorities reported using a Remotec model F-5 to deliver a one-pound payload of C-4 and detonation cord to the target. In a news conference on Monday, Dallas Police Chief David Brown clarified that officials used a Remotec Andros Mark V-A1. He also said that the machine was purchased in 2008 for roughly $151,000. The whole idea was improvised in about 15 to 20 minutes.
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A lot of attention has focused on the novelty of using a robot for offensive purposes and what it might mean for future policing, but it's actually very hard to discuss the ethics of this tactic without talking about the explosive used. The bomb type, how it was deployed, and what, if any, collateral damage may have been caused are all integral to our understanding of the incident.
Well, C-4 is an extremely versatile bomb. Not only can it be used to blow things up wholesale, it can also be molded by hand to produce directional explosions. That allows users to punch holes through objects or break other things cleanly in two.
Asked by his officers how much C-4 to use, Brown said he trusted their judgment.
"I said, 'Don't bring the building down,'" he said. "But that was the extent of my guidance."
"If I took a block of C-4 in there, or high explosives, there's a good chance I'm going to not just damage this guy really badly, but I'm also going to probably disrupt the building in a really bad way," Barnett said.
When C-4 explodes, the initial shock wave travels at a rate of 26,400 feet per second. A little over a pound of C-4 is enough to blow up a truck, which suggests that the payload used by Dallas police probably did some appreciable damage, although Brown said that the robot itself was not destroyed in the blast. Only the machine's extension arm was damaged, and then only partially.
Ann Hatch, a spokeswoman for the Dallas County Community College, which runs the building in which the shooter took refuge, told The Washington Post on Saturday that college officials have not been allowed to assess the damage done to the building, because it was still under police control. But, she said, descriptions of where Johnson was killed by police — in a "garage" — are inaccurate. In fact, Johnson was on the second floor of a college building that occupies much of an entire city block.
How did the authorities maneuver their robot bomb there? It's possible that they used a bank of elevators to get the robot to the correct floor, Hatch said.
Dallas Police Chief David Brown detailed how
police used a "bomb robot" to take out one of the suspects who allegedly
shot officers in Dallas on June 7.
(Reuters)
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