The automated cleaner failed to stop at the front door of the hotel in Orchard Park in Cambridge on Thursday, and was still on the loose the following day.
News of the escape was spreading online and social media users flocked to Twitter to comment their opinion
Staff said it just kept going and “could be anywhere” while well-wishers on social media hoped the vacuum enjoyed its travels, as “it has no natural predators” in the wild..
It was found under a hedge on Friday.
Hotel staff posted the story of the robot vacuum’s great escape on social media, asking for it to be returned if found.
“Today we had one of our new robot vacuums run for its life,” the assistant manager wrote.
“They normally sense the lip at the entrance [to the hotel] and turn around, but this one decided to make a run for it.”
His disappearance went unnoticed for about 15 minutes and despite a search, it appeared the vacuum made a clean break for it.
The deputy manager assumed it might have been found and taken, pointing out that it was only compatible with the hotel’s docking and charging station and was therefore “useless” to everyone else
While some readers joked about the robot’s adventures, one feared for its safety in the great outdoors, pointing out that “nature abhors a vacuum”.
However, to everyone’s relief, the device was found nestled under a fence on Friday afternoon by a (human) hotel cleaner gracing the front entrance.
He’s been cleaned up and “is now happily back sitting on a shelf with the rest of his family of vacuum cleaners,” the hotel confirmed..
People praised the robot for ‘making a desperate bid for freedom’, and others joke it might now be cleaning up the streets near the Orchard Park hotel in Cambridge.
Others feared this could be the start of a Terminator-style uprising, but those fears proved unfounded as the vacuum cleaner was found under a hedge the next day.
