The Response Robotics Summer School 2013: Bringing responders and researchers together to advance Response Robotics

In this paper, we present the 2013 Response Robotics Summer School, an event for the dissemination of the challenges and Best-in-Class capabilities in response robotics, focusing on explosive ordnance disposal and remote handling. A particularly unique feature of this event was the close integration of the responder community in both the technical and practical sessions. This was made possible by co-locating and jointly running this event with the Bomb Response Technology Seminar, an annual workshop for civilian and military bomb squad personnel. This event also builds on a decade-long legacy of response robotics dissemination events. These events leverage the DHS-NIST-ASTM International Standard Test Methods for Response Robots as a common language with which responders, researchers, industry, students and test administrators may communicate their requirements, capabilities and motivations. It builds on the 2012 IEEE-RAS Safety, Security and Rescue Robotics Summer School and sets the stage for the 2014 IEEERAS Response Robotics Summer School.