The eighth training session on railway track maintenance, organised by ONCF and UIC Africa, took place on 20-24 September. The week-long training session was held online, bringing together 85 participants from 15 African railway networks.

The training session was officially opened by Mohamed Rabie Khlie, Chairman of UIC Africa and UIC Vice-Chairman, as well as Thierry Béra, UIC Coordinator, and the representatives of ONCF and the UIC Africa regional office in Rabat. In his opening speech, Mr Khlie explained how UIC Africa’s training sessions have evolved since 2013. Mr Béra then presented UIC and its objectives.

A special session was organised for participants from the UIC Africa and Middle East regions on 24 September. It was moderated by Mercedes Gutierrez, UIC Infrastructure & TTI Senior Advisor, and Danilo Sorrentino, Head of Vehicle-Track Interaction at SNCF Réseau. In her presentation on “Creating intelligent tracks that progress from manual inspection to predictive maintenance”, Ms Gutierrez talked about the UIC Rail System Department, the IRS migration work programme, the infrastructure subsystem and the TTI Sector. Mr Sorrentino presented the Harmotrack (Harmonisation of Track Quality Description and Assessment) project, focusing on project objectives, members and current status, networks and opportunities.