Getting all steamed up about Robotics – BayToday

George Flumerfelt admits he was floored when he first watched a Robotics event in North Bay.

The CEO and President of the Redpath group initiallythought Robotics was only for nerds and intellects.

He doesnt think that anymore.

In fact,now the head of the mining contracting and engineering firm believes robotic teams may be developing future engineers.

Thats why Flumerfelt is a Platinum Sponsor for theFIRST Robotics district event that will take place at Nipissing University from April 6th to 8th.

We like to do things that benefit the youth in our community where its possible, said Flumerfelt.

In our business - mining contractors and engineers - there is a fairly high technology component to what we do and people who could have a future with our company or the mining industry in general so its a natural sponsorship for us.

Organizers of the event held a media launch Monday morning just in time for the competition season to start.

Three northeastern Ontario teams were at the launch at Nipissing University includingFIRST Team 4069 from Lo-Ellen Robotics in Sudbury, FIRST Team 4152, Hoya Robotics out of Huntsville, and the host FIRST Team 1305, Ice Cubed out of North Bay.

The North Bay team has been gearing up the competitive season as they have been working on their new robot since January 7th.

This years competition theme is about steampunk, which is a genre of science fiction that has a historical setting and typically features steam-powered machinery rather than advanced technology.

Disney is involved withFIRST Robotics now and they are promoting the games and making them really colourful and fun and playful, stated organizer Nancy Dewar-Stenning.

So they have played up on the steampunk thing thats going on right now, so Steamworks is the name of the game and thats what they do. Theres an airship, its a complex game and its a lot of fun.

Ice Cubed team member Jessica Kelso is excited for the competitive season to begin.

Today is a day to celebrate the build season is over and competition season is beginning so hopefully we are ready, she said.

Kelso is also pumped knowing the big sponsors may be looking at future engineers during robotics competition.

A lot of our sponsors in general are just people who are involved in our team event so they get so excited about it and its just a giant gym full of nerds but nerds about all different things, she said.

The North Bay team will take part in its first robotics competition of the 2017 in Oshawa this weekend.

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Getting all steamed up about Robotics - BayToday