NEW DELHI: The Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) has developed a fire mitigation system in buses, which can detect fires in less than 30 seconds and extinguish it within a minute. The wider rollout of this technology will come as a big help to check mishaps, which often result in claiming multiple lives, particularly in sleeper buses.

A live demonstration of the technology, “Fire Detection and Suppression System (FDSS)”, was given on Monday at an event attended by Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and Road Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari.

The road transport ministry said demonstrations were given on water mist-based FDSS for passenger compartment and aerosol-based FDSS for engine fire. The FDSS for passenger compartment comprises a water tank of 80 litre capacity, a 6.8 kg nitrogen cylinder pressurised to 200 bar and a network of tubing with 16 number of atomizers, the ministry said.

FDSS for the engine comprises an aerosol generator with which the fire suppression could be achieved within 5 seconds of the system activation.

The active fire protection system has been developed by the Centre for Fire, Explosive and Environment Safety (CFEES), a DRDO laboratory. The transport ministry said CFEES has unique competency in the areas of fire risk assessment, fire suppression using different extinguishing mediums, modelling and simulation. It has developed systems for battle tanks, ships and submarines.

Although the fire threat is present in all the vehicles, the concern is more for school buses and sleeper coaches for long distance travel.

In August this year, at least five persons were killed in a bus fire in Karnataka while another 20 were killed in another similar bus fire in Kannuaj in Uttar Pradesh. There have been several fatal fire accidents in sleeper buses across states.