Sabotage: SNCF takes action to prevent further attacks on the rail network
Le Figaro, September 9, 2024
The sabotage against the railroad tracks on the night before the Olympic Games opening ceremony on July 26 has left its mark on the SNCF. Officially, the rail company prefers to highlight its handling of this XXL attack: within three days, all train traffic had been restored. “435 agents worked 3×8 for three days. The speed with which we were able to return to normal shows the resilience of our network in the face of a very large-scale attack”, says Damien Pallant, Deputy Director General of Safety at SNCF Réseau, which is responsible for France’s railroads. The general public has discovered the fragility of the French network. And, away from the microphones, tongues are wagging within the state-owned company: “We were stunned that several axes of our network were under attack at the same time,” says one of its executives.
A fortnight earlier, the group’s CEO Jean-Pierre Farandou had seemed confident during his visit to the SNCF Réseau Île-de-France supervision center. The head of this operations center, nestled somewhere in the Gare du Nord, had presented him with a reassuring system where 25 people working in 3×8 shifts, 7 days a week, monitored the state of the network on computer screens. With 50% of equipment fitted with sensors (rails, catenaries, etc.), they were immediately informed of any faults. And that’s not even mentioning the measures intended to thwart malicious acts on these installations. For this, SNCF Réseau felt it was already doing a great deal: anti-intrusion devices on signal boxes, protected electrical transformers…
“Over 2023 and 2024, we have invested a total of €60 million in the security of our facilities, compared with €40 million over the previous period”, says Damien Pallant. Clearly, this was still not enough. The old railway manager has a few excuses to make: “We hadn’t had any warnings that our installations would be particularly targeted,” explains Damien Pallant. With that in mind, it’s easy to see why it’s virtually impossible to secure the 28,000 km of rail track in France.
One question nevertheless remains: has SNCF sufficiently concealed these highly sensitive installations, from signal boxes to electrical transformers? Does it have the right measures to prevent these sensitive sites from being identified on the web? “A review has been carried out, and the documents currently online on the rail network are considered non-sensitive,” says SNCF Réseau. Arnaud Aymé, transport specialist at Sia, takes a slightly different approach: “When you’re on the train, you see these electrical transformers along the track. And they’re indicated on Google Maps, or almost.” What’s more, in addition to the railway workers, all those who work on the tracks (subcontractors or manufacturers of railway equipment) have access to a map of the installations.
More drones
To prevent further sabotage during the Olympic Games, the public authorities and the SNCF pulled out all the stops until last Sunday. On August 1, Gérald Darmanin, the resigning Minister of the Interior, stated that the police had been reinforced to secure the rail network “by stepping up night-time checks on routes adjacent to railroad lines”. For its part, SNCF has mobilized its agents to monitor the tracks. Two hundred and fifty agents from the group’s in-house rail security force were placed at strategic points. One thousand maintenance workers made rounds of the sites. And some fifty drones kept watch over them. “As we don’t have that many, we called in service providers to fly over our facilities,” explains Damien Pallant. “But we can’t extend such a large-scale operation now that the Olympic Games are over.”
As a result, SNCF is looking at ways of limiting the risk of another attack. For example, it will be moving the manholes where cables are buried away from the signal boxes, as a way of limiting the risk of fire. Anti-intrusion devices on the most critical installations will also be reinforced. More video surveillance cameras and drones are also on the drawing board. And to improve detection of human presence, SNCF will be more systematically clearing the vegetation around these sites, which can serve as camouflage for saboteurs. However, given the inflexible tendering process specific to public companies, they won’t be available before 2025.
via: sansnom
Translated by Act for freedom now!