Photo/Illutration A transport robot designed by a University of Tokyo team rescues a mannequin representing a stranded hiker during a contest in Kami-Shihoro, Hokkaido, in mid-October. (Provided by the Japan Innovation Challenge)

KAMI-SHIHORO, Hokkaido--A university team became the first competitor to complete a robotics rescue mission that was previously deemed “reckless.”

The feat was accomplished at the eighth annual Alpine Rescue Contest, an event in which teams try to find and save a mannequin lost in nature using only remotely controlled robots.

The team from the University of Tokyo’s Laboratory of Biological and Mechanical Engineering became the first contestant ever to complete all three phases of the operation.

Five teams from around the country competed in the contest, which was held in a forest in Kami-Shihoro, Hokkaido, in mid-October.

In the scenario for the contest, a man picking edible wild plants goes missing.

In the contest, the teams must complete a three-stage mission.

For the first stage, the competitors are tasked with locating the mannequin using drones.

They then must deliver a rescue kit to the mannequin.

In this year’s contest, the contestants were required to operate drones for the discovery and delivery processes from Tokyo, about 900 kilometers from the rescue site.

In the third and final stage, the teams must send robots from the starting point at the foot of the mountain, retrieve the dummy, and bring it back to the starting point.

They are given 300 minutes to complete the third phase.

Several teams have completed the first two stages. But no team had been able to finish the rescue in the third stage.

“The mission was regarded as ‘reckless’ because it was too challenging, but the goal was reached in less than 10 years,” said Tatsufumi Kamimura, 49, head of the event’s steering committee. “I hope contestants will work hard to push innovation further for social implementation.”

The University of Tokyo team, competing for the third time, brought two machines to the third stage.

One was a commercially available mini excavator, which was modified for remote operation. The other was a transport vehicle designed to carry the mannequin.

After leaving the starting point, the mini excavator passed through a forest path for nearly 1 kilometer and reached the mannequin, which was in a “sasa” bamboo bush about 10 meters off the path.

The team remotely controlled the arm of the mini excavator to put the mannequin on the transport vehicle and made the return trip. It completed the third stage in 4 hours and 36 minutes, or 24 minutes under the time limit.

Damage to the dummy in the rescue mission was within the guidelines.

Last year, the Todai team managed to grab the mannequin but had to withdraw from the competition when the excavator got stuck in a ditch on its way back.

Two contests ago, the team’s machine stopped working due to mechanical failure when it was lifting the mannequin.

This year, the team flew a drone equipped with a high-magnification camera to monitor the rescue location. It also increased the data transmission speed to eliminate video delays.

These adjustments significantly increased the team’s situational awareness and work efficiency, the team said.

“Honestly, I was frequently on pins and needles, but we managed to accomplish the task by overcoming all the drawbacks we had from the previous challenges over the years,” said Yutaka Kaizu, 54, an associate professor at the university who was in his fourth competition.

The team was awarded 20 million yen ($130,000).

The contest, hosted by the Kami-Shihoro town office and a robot service provider in Tokyo, has become an incubation ground for technologies that could be used to find and save people lost or stranded on mountains, even at night or in dangerous terrain.

Using a technology born from the contest, an organization was founded to conduct drone-based night searches.

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