Forward facing cameras on Southeastern Class 707s

[KT550]

I noticed yesterday that some of Southeastern's 707s have what appears to be a forward facing camera on the front.
However, they are only fitted on one of the cab ends, so when units are working in multiple, the camera may be in the middle of the train.

Does anyone know if these are cameras and why only one fitted?

 

[aleggatta]

Likely time constraints on depot, unlike other fleets where forward facing cameras are fitted 707s already have Petards CCTV so its a much simpler task to add a single camera into a unit, rather than replacing the entire CCTV system as on other units.

 

[Stephen42]

If it's the separate camera on the yellow front, it is a thermal imaging camera for infrastructure monitoring. With the age of the train I'd expect all units to have forward facing CCTV, believe might be positioned below the destination board on this fleet. There's a press release from the company behind the tech with an image of the camera which should help confirm this is the camera you mean.

These were originally put on a pair of units as a trial using external modules and then later hardwired after the successful trial. Network Rail have access to the data, with automation to flag potential issues that can be addressed before a failure impacting service. For infrastructure monitoring only need a subset of the fleet fitted to give good coverage as the data won't change that often.

 

[KT550]

If it's the separate camera on the yellow front, it is a thermal imaging camera for infrastructure monitoring. With the age of the train I'd expect all units to have forward facing CCTV, believe might be positioned below the destination board on this fleet. There's a press release from the company behind the tech with an image of the camera which should help confirm this is the camera you mean.

These were originally put on a pair of units as a trial using external modules and then later hardwired after the successful trial. Network Rail have access to the data, with automation to flag potential issues that can be addressed before a failure impacting service. For infrastructure monitoring only need a subset of the fleet fitted to give good coverage as the data won't change that often.

Yes, the photo in the press release is what I saw.