APOPO equips rescue rats with streaming backpacks to find quake victims

Nonprofit APOPO trains African giant pouched rats, dubbed RescueRATs, to search rubble after earthquakes and building collapses. Their custom backpacks weigh under 100 grams and carry a camera, microphone, speaker, flashlight, fan and battery for up to 35 minutes of streaming, enabling two-way contact with survivors. The first cohort moved to Turkey in June for operational trials.

• Backpack weighs no more than 100 g, under 10% of a rat's body weight
• Battery supports up to 35 minutes of live streaming
• GPS fails in rubble, so APOPO is exploring SLAM mapping
• First RescueRATs cohort began trials in Turkey in June