The East Coast Railway (ECoR) has decided to install an intrusion detection system (IDS) to prevent the death of elephants on railway tracks.

The IDS, for which Rs 79.12 crore has been sanctioned, is based on distributed laser sensing technique, which would locate and detect the presence of elephants near the tracks so that the speed of trains in the sections can be reduced. The IDS will be installed at sensitive locations in elephant passing zones and elephant corridors.

Odisha is home to over 1,900 elephants spanning three elephant reserves and has 12 identified elephant corridors. According to railway sources, around 40 elephants were killed on the tracks in the last 10 years in Odisha.

In a media release issued on Friday, the ECoR said: “The IDS will help to detect wild elephants approaching the railway tracks and alert railway officials to help to avert elephant deaths. The optical fibres will be used as sensors to identify the movements of wild animals at locations and alert control offices, station masters, gatemen and loco pilots. It uses a fibre optic-based acoustic system working on the principle of scattering phenomenon to sense the real-time presence of elephants on the tracks.”

The IDS can monitor unusual movements up to a stretch of 60km. It will also help in detecting rail fractures and trespassing on tracks besides sending alerts on disaster mitigation due to landslides or unauthorised digging near the tracks.

“The system’s primary application is an intrusion
detection system based on distributed acoustics sensing (DAS) technique, which should locate and detect the presence of elephants near the track so that speed of
the trains in the sections
will be reduced. The system shall be capable of sending alarms to the loco pilot unit (tablet with internet facility) via SMS/Internet with a GPS tag, providing information about the location of elephants. The system shall detect and locate moving elephants near or on the track areas of ballasted track,” the release added.

The communication unit will display elephant movement through an audio-visual alarm on the local display. It will also send information to the central DAS server for notification to the relevant person over the railway’s existing communication network.

The project aims at developing an affordable solution for large-scale monitoring
and early warning of elephant intrusion. After analysing
the signal processing methods, the most suitable technique for real-time detection of elephants is chosen and simulated.

The project will be implemented in six railway sections covering a 200km stretch under Sambalpur and Khurda Road divisions in the first phase.

These are Maneswar-Bamur, Turekela-Lakhna, Arand-Arang Mahanadi, Norla-Theruvali in Sambalpur Division and Kapilas Road-Rajathgarh-Angul, Rambha-Ganjam and Nayagarh-Porjanpur Railway Section under Khurda Road Railway Divisions of East Coast Railway.