<p>Before the year is out, the Navy will start a fire on one of its ships and send in a robot to put it out.</p><p>Designed at Virginia Tech and the University of Pennsylvania, the Shipboard Autonomous Firefighting Robot, or SAFFiR, is a two-legged machine built to climb stairs and open watertight hatches just like a human. But Dennis Hong, one of SAFFiR's developers, said the robot is built to withstand flames and smoke that humans might not survive.</p><p>Continue reading below</p><p>"This is almost science fiction, but it's real," Hong said.</p><p><a href="http://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2014/04/07/robots-rescue-one-step-time/Gr3K24oCgrmE4FhVlvdoKM/story.html">Keep reading...</a></p>