Central Railway zone is thinking to use drones for increasing and to improve the surveillance process of the areas coming under its jurisdiction.
Mumbai division of Central Railway’s has currently acquired two Ninja UAVs for better security and efficient surveillance purpose in area like station premises, railway track section, yards, workshops etc.
Chief spokesperson of Central Railway, Shivaji Sutar said, “a team of four staff members from Modernization Cell of the RPF has been trained and obtained licence for flying those drones”. He also said that they can do real time tracking, video streaming and (operate in) automatic fail-safe made.
The operational range of drone is of 2 km and fly upto 25 minutes. It take -off weigh is upto 2kg and able to capture HD image at 1280×720 pixels during daylight. The drone system has made surveillance over large area with limited man power, it has become important and cost effective surveillance emerging as new surveillance technology.
The benefits of Drone will be:
- Ensuring safety of Railway property including yards, workshops, etc.
- Avoidance of any criminal and anti social activities in railway premises including gambling, throwing of garbage, hawking etc.
- Identification of weaker and vulnerable section for safe operations of trains and Keeping eye on disaster sites and coordinating with other agencies.
- Monitoring of crowd during the delicate and critical situation.
- Mapping of Railway assets to assess the encroachments on Railway property.
It will act as an “eye in the sky” for the Central Railway’s and will monitor the whole area. Drones are very useful in the assessment of vulnerable sections and for safe operational activities, surveillance on disaster sites and coordination with the other agencies.
It is designed to monitor the criminal activities, suspicious activities and to keep on eye on the railway’s assets. Any suspicious activities if noticed is intimated to the nearest RPF post of division to apprehend the criminal.
