If you are a seasoned bike rider, chances are that your city police has been running a campaign aggressive enough for you to have memorised all the puns you could crack around the helmet. But three IIT Roorkee guys are here to give your everyday helmet a space upgrade - making it an inflatable device which, via sensors, can essentially blow up, and create a cushion around your cranium protecting you from an impact. Yes, we think its fancy too!
The device has been developed by Sarang Nagwanshi, Mohit Siddha, and Rajvardhan Singh, of BTech (Final Year) Mechanical Engineering from IIT Roorkee.
With nearly 100,000 people dying every year due to cranial injuries in India, either our campaigns aren't effective enough or our helmets aren't great. The three IIT Roorkee students who went gaga around inflatable space gear during their internship with ISRO, had a pretty awesome brain-spark with regard to road safety, given the numbers.
"Inflatable safety structures aren't exactly a new concept, but they have been sidelined in the past few years," says Rajvardhan Singh, one of the developers of the device, a final year B Tech student from IIT Roorkee. "Our collective idea is to bring these structures together and build applications which will be available for more common use," he says.
The device is equipped with sensors to measure parameters such as acceleration, lean angle, velocity etc, to detect impact or collision. As soon as the impact is detected, the helmet inflates and forms a cushion around the cranium, which makes the helmet more effective. The tested concept of the airbag helmet has apparently proven that the inflatable device can reduce the force of impact by nearly four times that of a regular helmet, and is bound to reduce cranial injury numbers drastically.
While the product has still not reached mass production stage, the three IIT-ians do intend on getting it out in the market. "In India we got very limited support from an external source," says Sarang Nagwanshi, a member of the trio. But obviously they aren't losing hope - "we are reaching out to companies which are making Airbags and other relevant industrial agencies," Rajvardhan adds in.
Nearly 69 percent of total motor vehicles are motorcycles, and 27 percent of all road deaths in India are among those who ride two-wheelers. With all the crazy numbers, these airbag helmets may just be the answer Indian motorcyclists need.
