The DARPA Subterranean (SubT) Challenge aims to develop innovative technologies that would augment operations underground. The SubT Challenge allows teams to demonstrate new approaches for robotic systems to rapidly map, navigate, and search complex underground environments, including human-made tunnel systems, urban underground, and natural cave networks. The SubT Challenge is organized into two Competitions (Systems and Virtual), each with two tracks (DARPA-funded and self-funded). The Cave Circuit, the final of three Circuit events, is planned for later this year. Final Event, planned for summer of 2021, will put both Systems and Virtual teams to the test with courses that incorporate diverse elements from all three environments.

One of the biggest urban legends growing up in New York City were rumors about alligators living in the sewers. This myth even inspired a popular children's book called "The Great Escape: Or, The Sewer Story," with illustrations of reptiles crawling out of apartment toilets. To this day, city dwellers anxiously look at manholes wondering what lurks below. This curiosity was shared last month by the US Defense Department with its appeal for access to commercial underground complexes. The US military's research arm, DARPA, launched the Subterranean (or SubT) Challenge in 2017 with the expressed goal of developing systems that enhance "situational awareness capabilities" for underground missions.