Rail System: Nigerian students develop RTDS technology to check vandalisation

*Young SitoAbasi Akpabot and Freda Anoetie Akpaffiong, students of Uyo Secondary School, In Akwa Ibom State, developed the Rail line Threat Detection System (RTDS), to save the Federal Government huge funds from allocations for rail tracks repairs due to vandalism

Isola Moses | ConsumerConnect

Students of the Noble International Secondary School, Uyo, Akwa Ibom State of Nigeria, have developed a technology that when deployed, could alert officials of the Railway Corporation of any threat to rail tracks in the country.

ConsumerConnect reports SitoAbasi Akpabot and Freda Anoetie Akpaffiong, students of Uyo Secondary School, who developed the Rail line Threat Detection System (RTDS), said that it would save the Federal Government a lot of funds that usually goes into rail tracks repairs due to vandalism.

Abuja-Kaduna railway route

Briefing reporters at in Abuja, FCT, at the weekend at the Innovation and Technology Expo organised by the Federal Ministry of Science and Technology, SitoAbasi and Freda said the innovation was borne out of their concern about the frequent rate of rail line vandalism and attendant devastating consequences in the West African country.

“There has been an issue of rail line vandalism and the country is spending a lot of money to repair these damages. So, in order to reduce the cost of repairs for our government, we have developed this technology.

“The technology when in use would keep the rail transportation system on the path of sustainable economic growth,” they stated.

Adegboye Olaoluwa Ayodeji, Coordinator of the Junior Engineers, Technicians and Scientists (JETS), while speaking at the event explained that the system of the Rail line Threat Detector is wired in such a manner that it can help stop the trend of rail tracks vandalism in Nigeria.

Adegboye said: “These children use a very simple theory in physics which is the theory of Voltage divider, when you have a parallel connection of resistors in series with nominal resistors, there is a way voltage is divided across such connection, and that is what has been used in developing this technology.

“The project is very visible, the major component of the technology is the rail line itself, because the rail lines are made of rolling steels, the resistance per kilometre of the rolling steels is about 0.3 ounce, so these rolling steels are what we use in place of the resistors.”

The JETS Coordinator also stated: “The rolling steels are connected in parallel, anytime there is a short circuit or an open circuit, they will change the output of the voltage and connection.”