EPS shows new anti-terrorist barrier

Terrorists using vehicles to drive into crowds of pedestrians has become an all-too-common phenomenon in recent years. Preventing them from carrying out such attacks is the aim of a new barrier system from EPS. The Italian company’s Hostile Vehicle Mitigation (HVM) system consists of a series of hexagonal bases, each holding a large vertical pillar. The system is made of steel throughout, with the individual bases able to be connected with steel pins to create a customised barrier.
March 21, 2018 Read time: 2 mins
Stopping the threat: Luca Giubilato
Terrorists using vehicles to drive into crowds of pedestrians has become an all-too-common phenomenon in recent years. Preventing them from carrying out such attacks is the aim of a new barrier system from 8718 EPS.


The Italian company’s Hostile Vehicle Mitigation (HVM) system consists of a series of hexagonal bases, each holding a large vertical pillar. The system is made of steel throughout, with the individual bases able to be connected with steel pins to create a customised barrier.

The company says that the shape of the HVM was inspired by the Giant’s Causeway, a geological phenomenon on the coast of Northern Ireland, which consists of a series of interlocking basalt columns.

The company has chosen Intertraffic for the first showing of the new system. Engineer Luca Giubilato from EPS’s research and development team said that tests had shown the system capable of withstanding the impact of a 3.5-tonne truck being driven at it at 48km/h.

The basic weight of each unit is 281kg, but the strength and rigidity of the system can be further increased by slotting a solid steel weight inside each of the vertical pillars. That boosts the weight to 700kg.

The system is designed so that if an attacker’s vehicle rides up over the first column, it will slump on top of the pillars, rather than clearing them.

The individual modules are installed and removed using a hydraulic crane.

EPS has taken out a patent on the system, which has already aroused interest from potential customers in Switzerland and Norway, said Giubilato.

Stand 6.403

%$Linker: 2 External <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-16"?><dictionary /> 0 0 0 link-external www.eps.net false http://www.eps.net/ false false%>

For more information on companies in this article

EPS

Related Content

  • Bespoke weigh-in-motion data logger from Kistler
    September 7, 2014
    Kistler is using its booth to highlight to the American market a bespoke weigh-in-motion (WIM) data logger designed to interface with Lineas WIM sensors. The company says this combination allows users to monitor traffic in real time and gather key vehicle data including weight and imbalance, axle loads and spacing, speed and driving behaviour.
    Read More
  • Petrol/diesel cars could be fined for using London’s ‘electric streets’
    September 4, 2018
    Drivers in London, UK, could be fined £130 for not using electric or hybrid vehicles on nine ‘electric streets’. The project is intended to cut pollution and improve air quality. Drivers of petrol and diesel cars will be restricted from using some roads in the Shoreditch and Old Street areas of the city between 7am-10am and 4pm-7pm on weekdays.
    Read More
  • CTS extends contactless payments to Sydney's trains
    November 28, 2018
    Cubic Transportation Systems (CTS) is extending Sydney’s contactless payment system beyond light rail and ferries to include the Australian city’s train network. The technology allows commuters to pay for ticketing via credit cards, smart watches and other electronic devices, alongside the Opal card. CTS’s Asia-Pacific team and Transport for New South Wales initially made the contactless system available for the city’s Manly ferry service in 2017. In March this year, the contactless system was ext
    Read More
  • Webinar: BigDataEurope for Transport
    September 10, 2015
    The first BigDataEurope at 1000 CET on 21 September will look at the societal challenge of Smart, Green and Integrated Transport. The webinar sets out to introduce the BigDataEurope project in general as well as the various stakeholders and applications for Big Data in the Transport domain in particular, followed by a question and answer session. More information on the agenda and speakers will be available shortly. Register for the seminar here.
    Read More

Highlighted Content