Millions of tourists leave the comforts of Shanghai, Beijing or Suzhou every year to live a different experience: contemplate and, of course, climb the famous Mount Tai. However, reaching the top of this site in Shandong province is not an easy task. Those who dare to take on the challenge must face more than 6,000 stepsboth up and down.
Sometimes, in addition to discovering temples and other historical treasures along the way, they may come across the latest in robotic technology. As Xinhua points outsome robots walk up and down. Its purpose? Help the site workers with cleaning tasks and entertain visitors with some tricks.
Quadrupeds on Mount Tai
The robots are part of an initiative by one of the companies in charge of maintaining the place. Taishan Cultural Tourism Group Property Management considered incorporating quadruped robots industrial to transport not only garbage, but also heavy goods from one point to another on the difficult journey of Mount Tai.
This is a job that was previously done manually, but is now assisted by Unitree B2 robots. Each unit can carry up to 120 kg and is capable of reaching the top point in about two hours. The initiative has also served to test the performance of these small machines in a demanding environment.
The Chinese-made robots, they explain, perform well on the steepest and most difficult sections of the road, even when carrying several kilograms of weight on their backs. But, as we say, not all robots do heavy work. Others stand on two legsthey jump and perform various pirouettes to entertain tourists.
Some people may wonder why another transportation system, such as some type of rail vehicle, is not used. The answer is that Mount Tai has been declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO. Given its historical and cultural importance, the aim is to avoid any intervention that modifies the original configuration of the landscape.
The use of robots, for now, it is not definitive. The company behind the initiative is collecting data in various tests and sharing them with the manufacturer, Unitree, to identify if this is the right solution. One visitor told Tide News that imagines a future where these robots are also capable of transporting people in this tourist destination.
Images | Xinhua
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