KAVACH
- SCI & TECH
News:
Explained | Understanding
the Kavach system
What's
in the news?
●
Indian Railways' automatic train collision
prevention system Kavach has so far been deployed on only 1,465 Route km (Rkm)
since the first field trials on the passenger trains started in February 2016,
railways minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said in a written reply in Lok Sabha.
Kavach System:
● It is an indigenously
developed Automatic Train Protection (ATP) system.
● Kavach was developed by
the Research Design and Standards Organisation (RDSO) under Indian Railway (IR)
in collaboration with Medha Servo Drives Pvt Ltd, HBL Power Systems Ltd and
Kernex Microsystems.
● It is a set of electronic
devices and Radio Frequency Identification devices installed in
locomotives, in the signalling system as well the tracks, that talk to each other using ultra-high radio frequencies to control
the brakes of trains and also alert drivers, all based on the logic programmed into them.
● Since 2016, the railways have been carrying out field tests for
Kavach on passenger trains.
Applications:
● It has been designed to assist locomotive pilots in avoiding
Signal Passing At Danger (SPAD) and overspeeding.
● The system can alert the loco pilot, take control of the brakes
and bring the train to a halt automatically when it notices another train on
the same line within a prescribed distance.
● The device also continuously relays the signals ahead to the
locomotive, making it useful for loco pilots in low visibility.
● It also controls the speed of the train by an automatic
application of brakes in case the loco pilot fails to do so.
● It helps the loco pilot in running the train during inclement
weather conditions such as dense fog.