Railways

Railway weather conditions

Precipitation, Present Weather & Visibility:

Understanding Precipitation types (Rain, Snow, Freezing Rain, Hail & Sleet) can play a key role in Railway weather monitoring solutions.

Optical Scientific’s OWI series (Optical Weather Identifiers) provide operators with real-time and precise measurement of precipitation and present weather conditions that can impact railway operations

Since. the mid 1980’s, sensor technology has existed to very accurately measure rain and snowfall by means of opto-electronic precipitation-induced scintillation. The OWI-430 & OWI-650) offer accurate real-time measurement of present weather & Visibility along with accurate measurements of instantaneous rain rate and liquid water equivalent for snow. This technology has none of the common errors of mechanical gauges, is much more accurate and needs virtually zero maintenance.

Accurate measurement of rain snow, sleet, freezing drizzle and hail is an important measurement because they can all impact railways differently especially around bridges and switching stations.

OSI’s optical sensors have been used in a wide variety of critical infrastructure applications such as Airports (FAA), Roadways (DOT) and even out on data buoys. In 1997 The Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) – a joint U.S.-Japan space project utilized our technology to measure rainfall over the Pacific ocean and thus supply the ground truth for calibrating space-borne sensors.

The lifetime operating cost of our sensors figured over even a few years. So it is actually more economical to implement our sensors for long term use compared to any of the mechanical gauges.

Any Tipping bucket rain gauges and related mechanical gauges, such as the weighing rain gauge, have common and severe limitations in both accuracy and reliability. These gauges suffer from mostly under-estimation errors due to sampling intervals, wind induced deformations, surface wetting, evaporation, splash issues, orifice clogging due to insects, droppings and wind-blown debris along with limited dynamic range. For freezing precipitation, either environmentally unfriendly antifreeze chemicals or large amounts of heat are needed to make any kind of measurement.

Products applicable on Railways

DSP-WIVIS Weather Identifier and Visibility Sensors

Measures visibility and detects and quantifies rain, snow, drizzle, freezing and mixed precipitation conditions. Our basic OWI featuring the adaptive algorithm software, DSP-based analysis, sturdy performance, and accuracy our customers have come to expect as the norm.

HIP-100, HIPS Hail and Ice Pellet Add-On Sensors

HIP-100 is an acoustic sensor developed as an add-on option to the OWI-series Weather Sensors, giving an even greater range of weather data collection. It is difficult to discriminate a solid ice particle from a water droplet using optical techniques alone...