Digital Advances Aid Disaster Recovery Work


Digital advances aid disaster recovery work

Construction machinery makers are adopting digital technologies to improve disaster recovery work.

This comes as Japan marks on Monday one year since Typhoon Hagibis made landfall in the country. The storm caused rivers to overflow, inflicting considerable damage.

Komatsu streamlined repair work by introducing 3D mapping technology based on land survey data collected by drones.

It used to take several days in some cases for workers to conduct on-site assessment of damage and create blueprints for repair work.

With the new method, the time is reduced to only several hours, allowing recovery work to start earlier.

A Komatsu official says digital technologies have been steadily advancing. He says shorter repair work will also help reduce the occurrence of secondary damage.

Elsewhere, Hitachi Construction Machinery developed an app that allows users to measure amounts of soil by filming it with smartphones. The technology can be used to gauge the volume of mudslides.

Caterpillar adopted a system that enables workers to remotely operate heavy machinery as far as 400 meters away, even in inaccessible places.