Free Republic

Japanese Robot Eats Snow, Poops Out Bricks of Ice Wednesday, January 02, 2008 What's cute, yellow, eats snow and poops out bricks of ice? Meet Yuki-taro, a Japanese robot built to quickly clear roads after heavy snows. The cute little guy, about 5 feet long and 2 and a half feet high, simply plows into snowbanks, taking in the white stuff, compressing it and neatly stacking it in two-foot-long bricks on his rear bed. Created by a consortium of private companies, municipal governments and university researchers, Yuki-taro is equipped with two video cameras in his "eyes" as well as a...

Dodie Wheaton and her friend were driving into town for snow cones Sunday night when she saw the passenger door of an oncoming car open - and watched in horror as a toddler tumbled onto the road. "Stop! Baby!" she shouted to her friend, Paul Heter, who did as instructed, and Wheaton sprinted to the middle of Woody Seat Freeway to fetch the girl. The girl, 2-year-old Raven Schmidt, "had hit the ground hard," Wheaton said. Schmidt was responsive when emergency crews arrived shortly after 8:30 p.m., but was later taken by EagleMED helicopter from Hutchinson Hospital to Wesley Medical...