Fog, lack of hi-tech device stalls Railways

In the battle against blinding fog, the railways are back to being powerless, as their apex body on technology has recently rejected the only high-tech solution available to trains caught in poor visibility conditions. Avishek G Dastidar reports.

In the battle against blinding fog, the railways are back to being powerless, as their apex body on technology has recently rejected the only high-tech solution available to trains caught in poor visibility conditions.

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The Research Designs and Standards Organisation (RDSO) has rejected the prototype of the Fog Safe Device, a GPS-based technology, that was about to be deployed after over two years of dillydallying.

The organisation has suggested certain key alterations to the device, which enables train drivers to know the status of an approaching signal even in lowest visibility conditions. Northern Railway was about to deploy the device on a large scale this winter. "There need to be certain changes to the device, without which we cannot install them in trains," said Amitabh, Additional Divisional Railway Manager, Delhi.

Unlike the Metro, railways do not have any technology of 'cab signalling', which flashes the approaching signal on the driver's control panel, negating the need to actually sight the signal. As of now, therefore, going slow is the only option left for trains passing through fog.

Consequently, all major super-fast trains are running at the same speed as non-superfast trains and are delayed by hours. Acting as a great leveller of sorts, fog has made Rajdhanis, Shatabdis and even the ultra-fast Durontos make speeds of about 60 km/hour.

Rajdhanis and Durontos usually cover around 110 km per hour. All lines of priority among trains have been blurred, as even Rajdhanis have been arriving after uncharacteristic delays.

The Howrah Rajdhani was nine hours late, while the Bhubaneshwar Rajdhani was late by 20 hours on Monday.

"We do not make any distinction between trains in terms of speed during fog. All trains are functioning with similar speed restrictions," said Manish Tiwary, Northern Railway spokesman.