Colossus UGV, of Sharks Robotics, saved Notre-Dame de Paris.

Ground drones are not only meant for military use. The dramatic fire that ravaged the Notre-Dame cathedral in Paris, this black Monday 15th of April, gave a fantastic opportunity to demonstrate the invaluable role played by “Colossus”, a 200kg-tracked drone manufactured by the French company Sharks Robotics.

Sharks Robotics "Colossus", a major technical asset of the Paris fire brigade to fight the fire ravaging the cathedral of Notre-Dame (Picture source: Army Recognition)

The 400 firemen involved in the firefight used Colossus to enter the blazing cathedral and water various places where it would have been too dangerous – and sometimes too difficult – to perform the work with men. Compliments to Sharks Robotics went to the extent of saying that Colossus enabled to save the cathedral.

Shark Robotics is a French company that designs and produces terrestrial drones. Leader in the market thanks to its expertise in robotics and precision mechanics, Shark Robotics assists its customers in the engineering, development and design of robotic platforms designed to keep men from risk. Shark Robotics is active in the fields of security, defense, industry and nuclear. Shark Robotics robots combine power, reliability and robustness.

Colossus is a versatile and flexible technical support robot designed to work in risk areas. Able to evolve on any type of terrain, this robot assists the man to extinguish fires, carry equipment or injured, perform information and visual recognition (HD 360 ° camera with X25 zoom, camera day/night, thermal camera, NRBC detectors etc.). The product was developed with the BSPP (Paris Fire Brigade).