Russia sends its first humanoid robot to Fedor

Fedor, who carries the identification number Skybot F850, left this Thursday at 6:38, Moscow, aboard a Soyuz rocket, launched from the Russian cosmodrome of Baikonur, Kazakhstan. It is estimated that you should reach the International Space Station (IEE) on Saturdays and stay there for 10 days, until September 7th. The ship used for launch is equipped with a new digital control system and latest generation engines.

The robot, with an anthropomorphic body in silver, measures 1.80 meters and weighs 160 kilos. Fedor is not just a Russian name, but also an acronym in English which means "Final research on experimental demonstration objects".

The humanoid already has accounts on social networks Instagram and Twitter, in which his daily life and his exploits are told, such as learning to open a bottle of water.

On board the ISS, the robot will perform various tasks under the supervision of Russian cosmonaut Alexander Skvortsov, who joined the International Space Station team last month, according to the RIA Novosti news agency. .

Fedor will test its capabilities under conditions of very low gravity. One of his main skills is to mimic human movements, to help astronauts perform their tasks.

"He must perform five or six tasks" which are secret, "said Yevgeny Dudorov, head of the company that created Fedor, according to the same source.Her operations will require him to handle a screwdriver and keys, said Alexander Bloshenko, director of the promising programs of the Russian space agency Roscosmos, in an interview with the Rossiyskaya Gazeta newspaper.

Fedor is not the first robot to visit outer space. In 2011, NASA sent the humanoid Robonaut 2, developed in cooperation with General Motors, with the same goal: to make it work in a high-risk environment. But he returned to Earth in 2018 due to technical problems.

In 2013, Japan launched a small robot, Kirobo, in space, which coincided with the arrival of the first Japanese commander of the IED, Koichi Wakata. This device was able to speak, but only in Japanese.

Beyond this specific mission, the Russian authorities, for whom the conquest of space is a strategic issue, do not hide their ambitions for Fedor and his future brothers.

According to Alexander Bloshenko of Roscosmos, these machines could perform dangerous operations, such as sorties in space, to RIA Novosti.

The Patriotic Director of Roscosmos, Dmitry Rogozin, showed photos of Fedor to the Russian President in August, Vladimir Poutine, introducing the robot as a "team badistant" of the IEE.