4 ms·
My understanding is that this kind of industrial robot should never be active while humans are near. So one possibility would be that the usual safety precautio
by fabian2k 3y ago
My understanding is that this kind of industrial robot should never be active while humans are near. So one possibility would be that the usual safety precautions were ignored here as obviously a human was within reach while the robot was still powered on.
- mistercheph 3y agoYes, as far as I can understand the man and by extension his estate are liable for the damage to the machine and the disruption of the assembly line. The first of many preliminary injunctions against the family should be making their way through the court system about now.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- Cpoll 3y agoWould you be making the same comment if this story was about an electrician that failed to shut off power before examining wiring? If not, why not?
- davzie 3y agoPretty sure it’s satire / sarcasm!
- tsimionescu 3y agoYes, that's exactly the point - it seems to be sarcasm that suggests the writer believes it's immoral to say the person who tragically died did anything wrong in this situation. The poster above thus wonders whether an electrician who tragically dies after making a mistake in their job should also be held entirely blameless.
- bmitc 3y agoI am very confused as to why the robot was operating with such power. According to the article, the robots pick up boxes of peppers and place them on a conveyor belt. How does that translate to such force so as to pick up an adult man, place him on the conveyor belt, and then crush his face and chest? There are clearly multiple safety protocols that were broken here, starting with something as simple as a lockout/tagout procedure and ending with robotic control system failures that should have recognized it was needing to apply much more force than expected to pick and place a box of peppers and also that the thing it was handling was not a box.
- Symmetry 3y agoNormally robotic arms are either cobot arms or industrial arms. A cobot is relatively safe to be around. They're meant to work with humans nearby so generally you'd have to be both inattentive and unlucky to get an injury that needs any sort of treatment. But these arms are relatively expensive, slow, and most can barely handle the weight of a typical box of vegtable. Industrial arms like this are more common. They're less expensive, faster, and can handle an unusually large box of veggies no problem. And mostly any arm large enough to move the box far enough to be useful in your workspace is going to be able to lift way more weight. But these are not safe to be around and either inattention or bad luck when you're around it will send you to the hospital. And both at once and you end up like the poor worker in the story. Needless to say be careful around cobots but don't be careful around industrial arms, instead use some sort of lock out system that makes it impossible for the arm to move if you're in close proximity because there's no way anyone will ever be careful enough. So, I don't blame them for using an industrial arm. But there was a serious failure that occured to ever let a person into the area while the arm was live.
- bmitc 3y agoI know the difference between a cobot, like what Rethink Robotics made, and an industrial robot. But a pepper and thus a box of peppers is mostly air. It can't weigh anywhere close to an adult man. So the drive needed on the motors to pick up, place, and crush the man would be several times that of the box of peppers. I would think any industrial robot would have limit safety points for excessive drive beyond its intended use. The robots are used to do literally the same task every day, so it's surprising something like that isn't in place. Additionally, you would think there would be at least some vision system in place for safety purposes. My point is that there were safety failures at every level here.