Originally published on January 15, 2014

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Robots are being used by the U.S. Border Patrol to monitor underground tunnels built by drug cartels to smuggle contraband across the border.

Since 1990 nearly 170 tunnels have been found in on the U.S.-Mexico border, concentrated mostly in California and Arizona. These tunnels can range from crudely-dug crawlways to highly sophisticated tunnels complete with electricity, ventilation systems and rail tracks.

Border officers can remotely control the robot from the surface and receive live footage of the tunnels captured by its camera. The robot weighs around 12 pounds and can move freely through a tunnel that's several feet wide. It can traverse the length of a tunnel in a shorter amount of time than a person could. Using robots also has the benefit of protecting officers from the hazards of an unstable tunnel.

In one of the largest marijuana busts in the U.S., 32 tons of the drug were seized in the a 600-meter tunnel running from southern California to Mexico in late 2011.

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