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See Spot run — a job site.
A Long Island construction project has recruited a $100,000 mechanical mutt to walk the premises, ensuring maximum efficiency and safety for workers building the new wing of South Shore Hospital in Bay Shore.
“I would say it’s a morale booster,” Suffolk Construction’s Adam Fyrer, who handles the state-of-the-art Boston Dynamics-made robotic dog — aptly named Spot — told The Post.
“I think a lot of people haven’t seen this kind of technology in person. It’s something that excites them to come to work.”
Rather than doing tricks, Spot’s primary focus on the future site of a six-story building that will feature almost 100 new patient rooms is both worker and structural safety, according to Fyrer, who uses the bot on other projects as well.
Spot primarily conducts walkthroughs on the property that would conventionally be delegated to someone like a project manager, to create a “Google Street”-esque map that owners can refer to upon the job’s completion.
“The benefit of that is you get it more accurate and continuously throughout the job cycle,” Fyrer said, adding that Spot’s trips take off about an hour of labor a day at the Northwell Health facility.
Dog days
The yellow-and-black construction companion, which can run on a lithium-ion battery for approximately 90 minutes at a time, is also capable of self-navigating around obstacles or people on the move.
“It’s intelligent as well,” Fyrer said of the 75-pound device that can go up and down stairs with ease.
“It will be able to say, ‘hey, there’s something there,’ then stop, wait for it to pass, and then it will continue on its path — or it will find another way to go around that.”
Camera technology inside Spot can also be harnessed to identify any workers who aren’t adhering to safety codes on a job by detecting blatant violations, such as not wearing hard hats.
“Then we can trigger a conversation with that person.”
Clients like Northwell are also more than satisfied to see things propelled into the next generation, too.
“It’s nice to see a company thinking outside the box and bringing new technology in,” Vinod Nair, the hospital’s vice president of operations, said.
“As well as embracing higher, sophisticated technologies in the industry.”
Spot is also built to endure, according to Fyrer, who called the robot “extremely rugged.”
“Boston Dynamics did a phenomenal job building this system…it can take a hit,” he said.
“Lighter people have sat on it.”
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Man’s best friend
The robodog is also brought to area schools for demonstrations on what it can mean for their generation of technology and the workforce.
Fyrer maintains that advances like Spot won’t be stealing jobs, but making employees’ lives much easier.
“Look at some of the guys who were in the industry for 50, 60 years,” he said.
“‘They’re like, yeah, if I had something that was able to help me do my job, that was a robot, or assistive in nature, that would have saved my job and longevity.’”
However, at least in Bay Shore, more workers seem more obsessed than afraid, as several ran up to check out and interact with Spot during a Tuesday site walkthrough.
“That’s why we usually have to run him at night when hardly anyone is here,” Fyrer joked.