National Fire Agency Joins Hands with Hyundai Motor for AI Transformation...Aiming to Deploy 100 Unmanned Firefighting Robots

Robots Worth Around 2 Billion Won Each...Protecting Firefighter Safety
Challenge of Securing Data and GPUs...Full-Scale Project to Begin Next Year
Kim Seungryong: "We Will Create a Leading Case for AI Transformation in the Public Sector"

The National Fire Agency is using advanced artificial intelligence (AI) technology to improve work efficiency and protect the safety of firefighters. The agency has announced a plan to deploy up to 100 unmanned firefighting robots at fire scenes that are difficult for firefighters to access.

Kim Seungryong, Acting Commissioner of the National Fire Agency. Provided by the National Fire Agency

On February 9 at the Government Complex Sejong, Kim Seungryong, Acting Commissioner of the National Fire Agency, held a meeting with reporters and said, "We had initially planned to deploy 36 unmanned firefighting robots between 2027 and 2030, and we are now considering increasing that number to up to 100 in the future."

The unmanned firefighting robot jointly developed by the National Fire Agency and Hyundai Motor Group was deployed last month at the site of a fire at a household goods manufacturing plant in Maengdong-myeon, Eumseong-gun, North Chungcheong Province.

This robot is based on the "HR-Sherpa multipurpose unmanned vehicle" and is equipped with enhanced waterproofing and thermal insulation performance. It can extinguish fires at scenes where heat and smoke make it difficult for firefighters to approach.

In November last year, unmanned firefighting robots were assigned to four regional special rescue teams of the Central 119 Rescue Headquarters, and the fire in Eumseong, North Chungcheong Province, was the first incident where they were actually deployed to a fire scene.

Acting Commissioner Kim announced that on February 24, the agency will hold a demonstration of the unmanned firefighting robot at the Capital Region 119 Special Rescue Team in Namyangju, Gyeonggi Province.

He said that on that day, people will be able to see how the unmanned firefighting robot suppresses flames at a fire scene in place of firefighters. Hyundai Motor Group is reported to have donated four unmanned firefighting robots, each worth about 2.2 billion won, to the National Fire Agency free of charge.

In addition, the National Fire Agency plans to invest a total budget of 230 billion won to build an "AI-based next-generation 119 integrated system" that will make the entire process intelligent, from receiving emergency calls to dispatch and on-site response.

Under this system, when a citizen calls 119, AI will analyze the voice in real time and automatically determine and register the type of incident, location, and urgency.

Acting Commissioner Kim said, "We will soon be able to launch a system in which AI receives the emergency call and, in critical situations, triggers an alarm so that a controller can intervene, allowing humans and robots to manage the situation in a hybrid way."

He also expressed his ambition to create so-called "K-Firefighting," a model that the world will benchmark, by promoting an AI transformation (AX) across all firefighting work, thereby enhancing staff capabilities and generating research and development (R&D) outcomes.

To make AX at the National Fire Agency possible, it is essential to secure abundant data from the field. Acting Commissioner Kim said, "There are about 10 million 119 emergency calls received annually. If that data can be refined into a form suitable for machine learning, we will be able to apply agent AI and physical AI technologies to the firefighting field."

Yonhap News Agency

To this end, the agency needs to secure data engineers and graphics processing units (GPUs). However, as the related budget was not reflected this year, it plans to seek cooperation from relevant ministries such as the Ministry of Science and ICT. Starting next year, the agency intends to allocate a substantial budget for building AI data and to push the project in earnest.

Regarding the unmanned firefighting robots, Acting Commissioner Kim also explained future tasks, saying, "We need to develop tactics that link existing fire trucks with unmanned firefighting robots and to collect various behavioral and spatial data to further advance the system."

He added, "If that part is realized, it will be possible to implement physical AI in the firefighting domain for the first time in the world," and expressed his expectations by saying, "In the public sector, it could become the world's top leading case of physical AI."

Meanwhile, to prevent large-scale disasters and establish a more sophisticated response system, the National Fire Agency has drawn up "special emergency duty issuance and action standards" and will begin a six-month pilot operation this month.

Special emergency duty refers to an emergency preparedness posture that is declared when the risk of disasters such as fires increases or when major national events are held. It consists of three stages, from Level 1 to Level 3, strengthening prevention activities, readiness posture, and response systems at each stage. Through this, the agency aims to standardize situation management, dispatch readiness, on-site patrols, and cooperation with relevant organizations, thereby promoting more predictable and effective on-site response.

In particular, during the Lunar New Year holiday period, the National Fire Agency will declare Level 2 special emergency duty for fire stations nationwide to raise the level of response. It will focus on preemptive safety management activities tailored to the characteristics of the holiday, including strengthening duty on the command line, conducting mobile patrols, reinforcing personnel in situation rooms, and bolstering cooperation systems with related agencies.