Robot AL-76 Goes Astray
Author: Isaac Asimov
Published in Year: 1941
short story in the Series: Asimov's Robots
Set in the Universe: Foundation
Cover Notes
(:redirect quiet=1 RobotAL-76GoesAstray:) AL-76 (aka Al) is a robot designed for mining work on the Moon, but as a result of an accident after leaving the factory of US Robots and Mechanical Men, it gets lost and finds itself in rural Virginia. It cannot comprehend the unfamiliar environment and the people it meets are scared of it. When it comes across a shed full of spare parts and junk, it is moved to reprogram itself and builds a powerful mining tool of the kind it was designed to use on the Moon - but since it does not have the proper parts, it improvises and produces a better model, requiring less power.
When angrily told to destroy it and forget all about it, it obeys, and the secret of the reprogramming and the improved tool is lost.
Publication History
Publication history in print
- Robot AL-76 Goes Astray first published in 1941
- Robot AL-76 Goes Astray published in 1942