Indian Railways Deploys AI-Based Intrusion Detection System (IDS) for Elephant Protection

Key facts

• The Ministry of Railways and the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) have implemented technology-driven measures to prevent elephant-train collisions.
• The AI-enabled Intrusion Detection System (IDS) uses Distributed Acoustic Sensors (DAS) and optical fibre to detect elephant locomotion signatures in real-time.
• The IDS is currently operational across 141 route kilometres at critical locations within the Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR).
• Sanctioned IDS projects include NFR (403.42 km), East Coast Railway (ECOR) (368.70 km), Western Railway (WR) (115 km), and North Eastern Railway (NER) (99.18 km).
• Additional sanctioned IDS works cover Southern Railway (SR) (55.85 km), South Eastern Railway (SER) (55 km), Northern Railway (NR) (52 km), and East Central Railway (ECR) (20.3 km).
• Infrastructure measures include the construction of underpasses, ramps, fencing, and the installation of Honey Bee buzzer devices to act as a deterrent.
• The Railways is trialling thermal vision cameras for night-time detection and has installed solar-powered LED lighting in forest areas to improve visibility.
• Union Minister for Railways, Shri Ashwini Vaishnaw, stated that an average of 16 elephant-train collision incidents have been reported annually over the past five years.