RSF robotics team Singularity donates 3D printed face shields to Palomar Medical Center

Rancho Santa Fe-based FIRST Tech Challenge robotics team, Singularity, donated 100 custom-designed 3D printed face shields to Palomar Medical Center in Escondido on Thursday, July 9. The team delivered the face shields to the medical and Palomar Health Foundation staff outside the hospital with their computer-aided designed 3D printed competition robot as their way of practicing social distancing.

Wayne Herron, vice president of philanthropy at Palomar Health, said, “to have a robot actually come and deliver face shields, certainly this is the first time I’ve ever had anything like this happen. These shields are going to go to frontline health care workers trying to fight this virus. There’s an anticipated surge, hopefully it doesn’t happen, but if it does, this is going to help us be further prepared.”

As part of Singularity’s mission to “Shield Our Heroes” from infection from COVID-19, the team started a GoFundMe campaign to raise funds for supplying almost 1,000 face shields to health care workers in hospitals and nursing homes across the country and Mexico. With schools planning on re-opening in the fall, the team decided to expand their Shield Our Heroes campaign to include educators as heroes to also receive face shields to protect them and their students from the spread of COVID-19. They will make a virtual donation of 100 face shields using Zoom video conferencing at the next R. Roger Rowe School board of trustees meeting scheduled in August.

The face shields are produced in collaboration with Forecast 3D, a 3D printing firm in Carlsbad, and are designed to be reusable so that the clear plastic guard can be removed from the wrap-around adjustable head piece and disinfected easily. This gives doctors and nurses the ability to sterilize the shields between patient exams to help protect against the spread of the virus.

Virgin Galactic recently awarded Team Singularity a $1,700 grant submitted by team member Nick Sanford to be used in their two GoFundMe campaigns – Shielding Our Heroes and Designing Nasopharyngeal Swabs for COVID-19 Testing.

The team welcomes financial support to raise more funds to 3D print more face shields to distribute to more frontline health care and educator staff locally and around the country including Mexico. Here is a link to the team’s Go Fund Me page: gf.me/u/xywtn6.