So this is LITERALLY anticipated in a Tom Swift book I retained from my childhood.
“Firefighters from Connecticut and Melbourne have also used drones to check out fires before sending in manned crews. In one recent incident at a quarry near New Haven, they used a quadcopter to see how close a fire had got to a stack of explosives.
As well as scouting fires, Dubai is also exploring using a robot-like machine to fight them. Called Knight Hawk, it comes with water hoses and a foam and ventilation kit. Within 10 years, its creator, a Dutch company called Geoborn, expects to see completely autonomous machines. In the future, firefighters may not fight fires at all.
“Most fire brigades, whether in Belgium, the Netherlands or the U.K., do not allow their firefighters to enter a burning building,” says Folmer Kamminga, Geoborn’s managing director. “If a firefighter isn’t going to do that, then let a robot do it. Once there is demand for this, it will revolutionize the industry.”