Alliant Computer Systems Corp, Littleton, Massachusetts, says the computational centre of the Societe Nationale des Chemins de Fer Francais’s Rolling Stock Division, has installed a six-processor FX/800 parallel supercomputer; the new machine will be used by France’s national railway company for crash simulation, and will be dedicated to running Pamcrash crash simulation software using finite element analysis; in the future, SNCF will also use the system for aerodynamics, structural mechanics, suspension, electronics and electrical engineering, braking systems applications and other in-house programs which are currently running on the centre’s Alliant FX/80; the 80860 RISC-based FX/800 is SNCF’s third generation of Alliant machines; by the end of 1993, the centre expects to upgrade to an FX/2800 or massively parallel Campus/800 machine.
