Nitin Gadkari bats for sleep detection sensors for commercial vehicles

24 Sep 2021 CW Team

Minister of Road Transport and Highways Nitin Gadkari has asked officials to work on a policy for having sleep detection sensors of European standards in commercial vehicles.

On Tuesday, in a meeting of the National Road Safety Council (NRSC), Nitin Gadkari mentioned the need for fixed driving hours for truck drivers to reduce fatigue-induced road accidents.

He asked the members of NRSC to diversify areas of road safety to save more lives.

In 2020, there were nine million truckers and transporters that were involved in freight across the country. In 2018, in a study conducted by Castrol, around a quarter of truck drivers who participated had complained about sleep deprivation.

Guidelines for Effective Assessment of Driver Vigilance and Warning According to Traffic Risk Estimation (AWAKE) project for fatigue warning systems have been developed by the European Union's System.

The project AWAKE employs both driver state measures and traffic risk measures to conclude the need for warning the drivers. The change in steering, eyelid movement, driver's behaviour, accelerator and brake use and steering position are included in driver state measures. The sensor will detect the information or warning message that needs to be communicated to the driver.

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