Robot on wheels waters the graves of Regensburg cemetery

It has no reverse gear for the time being, but its manufacturers have promised to add that functionality

The City of Regensburg (Germany) relies on a gardening company to maintain one of its cemeteries, and that company relies on an autonomous robot on wheels to do the watering duties in order to keep the graves pristine.

Andres Weis, the owner of the gardening company, complained to BR.de that it was a hard task to find people to water the cemetery at night or in the early hours of the morning, which is why he is grateful for the autonomous helper manufactured by Innok Robotics in Regenstauf. The product name of the robot is formally known as “Rainos”, however, Andreas lovingly calls it “Gießbert”, which translates to something like Waterbert.

“Gießbert” holds 200 litres of water in its tank. It is equipped with pipes and nozzles that spray the mist over the graves. When it is emptied out, it automatically returns to a station for a refill.

The robot does its work at night because this is when the rate of evaporation is the lowest to ensure that the soil stays hydrated the longest. That way it also doesn’t disturb mourners who visit the graves of beloved ones during the day.

Bureaucracy vs Robots

Laser sensors on the wheeled robot ensure safety. They detect obstacles and help the robot to orient itself. "Gießbert" compares the scans with a stored map of the cemetery and thus recognizes where it is currently travelling. 

The gardening company has to maintain 800 graves, however, the robot can only water 200 of these because the alleys between the rest of the graves are too narrow and “Gießbert” cannot turn around. The promise, however, is that the robot will soon be equipped with a reverse gear to make it more manoeuvrable.

For Innok Robotics founder, Alwin Heerklotz, products like the watering robot are ideal solutions for various work situations, however, to him bureaucracy still hasn’t caught up to the speed of tech progress.

Robots like “Gießbert” need to be licensed individually for operations by the local cemetery authorities, and the issue is that these permits have to be decided on by people who are not robotics experts.