ISRO helps Indian Railways avoid accidents, provide real-time updates
What's the story
Indian Railways has roped in ISRO for a more efficient railway network, including checking accidents at unmanned crossings and providing passengers real-time updates on train movement.
The pilot project started as early as June. ISRO is assisting the Railways with its Navigation Satellite System (NaVIC).
Five train engines on different routes have already received ISRO-developed integrated circuits (ICs).
How exactly is ISRO helping Railways?
Accidents
How is NaVIC helping avoid mishaps at unmanned crossings?
To check accidents at unmanned crossings, ISRO has installed its ICs on five engines and hooters at such crossings.
The hooter, linked to NaVIC, will be activated as soon as an IC reaches within 500m-4km of it. It will keep getting louder as the train nears, thus warning people on road.
If the project is successful, it will be implemented across the country.
Updates
NaVIC will also help keep passengers updated about train movement
The same technology is also being used to provide people real-time updates about train movement.
Through it, Railways will send SMSs to passengers about arrival and departure of trains, delays in journey, time left to a particular station etc, all in real-time.
At present, local officials enter arrival/departure status of trains into a database, but often manipulate actual timings to avoid punishment for delays.
Information
Passengers will soon get a revamped IRCTC app, website
Railways, which has taken ISRO's help in its new website/app, has made efforts to make the portal user-friendly and clutter-free for faster and easier ticket-booking. There will be no timeout during booking. It will also help plan travel better by displaying dates and confirmed tickets.