In the face of natural or man-made disasters, search and rescue teams and other first responders like police, medical units, civil protection or volunteers, race against the clock to locate survivors within the critical 72-hour timeframe (Golden Hours), facing challenges such as instable structures or hazardous environments but also insufficient situational awareness – all resulting in lengthy search and rescue processes. In order to speed up the detection of survivors trapped in collapsed buildings and to improve working conditions for the first responders, the EU-funded research project CURSOR designed an innovative Search and Rescue Kit (CURSOR USaR Kit) based on drones, miniaturized robotic equipment, advanced sensors and incident management applications. The overreaching aim of CURSOR is to develop a USaR kit that will be easy and fast to deploy, leading to a reduced time in detecting and locating trapped victims in disaster areas. To make sure that these solutions meet the needs of the first responders in the field, the system was tested by first responders of the CURSOR consortium as well as by external practitioners (e.g. INSARAG secretariat, Regione Liguria, USaR NL, Bavarian Red Cross, Japan NRIFD) throughout the whole development process. Several lab and small scale field trials were conducted. Against this background the consortium identified the standardisation potential for this CEN Workshop Agreement, which describes a field test and the associated methodology for assessing the use of innovative technologies such as the USaR kit.
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