You are a Company or Platoon commander about to undertake an urban operation, which might culminate in contact with enemy forces. As you enter the urban terrain your views along main streets are relatively good, but are figures in the distance hostile or not? Elsewhere, your line-of-sight is blocked by walls, buildings, shrubbery and all the usual urban clutter, such as power and telephone poles and cables. What waits at the next intersection? What lies round the corner of the next building or concealed in houses or behind rooftop parapets?

Answering those questions is the crux of the MOD Grand Challenge. In response, Mindsheet have designed a cooperative set of miniature autonomous surveillance vehicles with a top speed of 35MPH. The vehicles are based on a rugged remote control toy platform.

Each vehicle can follow a pre-assigned mission plan and then wirelessly report back detected threats that may include: snipers, IEDs, militia and technicals to a base station. This allows the remote generation of situation reports without risk to ground troops who do not have to enter the hazard zone.

IED Bomb Inspection by Mindsheet Robot
Soldiers trial the Testudo robots for Improvised Explosive Device inspection.

Raglan Tribe demonstrates the Testudo robot to Vicki Butler-Henderson from the Channel 5 Fifth Gear show

The Mindsheet Grand Challenge Team

The Testudo Robot in its early stages of design

Chris Burgess operating the Ground Control Station

Testudo finds the technical threat

Testudo at Copehill Down

Testudo crosses a puddle

Testudo finds a marksman