Effect of exit location on flow of mice under emergency condition**Project supported by the National Key Research and Development Program of China (Grant No. 2016YFB1200404).

Abstract

The evacuation of crowds in a building has always emerged as a vital issue in many accidents. The geometrical structure of a room, especially the exit design has a great influence on crowd evacuation under emergency conditions. In this paper, the effect of exit location of a room on crowd evacuation in an emergency is investigated with mice. Two different exits are set in a rectangular chamber. One is located in the middle of a wall (middle-exit) and the other is at the corner of the chamber (corner-exit). Arching and clogging are observed in the flow of mice. The result based on the escape trajectories of mice shows a dynamic balance in the arch near the exit wherever the exit is located. We demonstrate that the occupant position in the arch has an effect on the escape sequence of mice. At a low stimulation level, the narrow middle-exit is more effective in increasing the flow rate of mice than the narrow corner-exit. However, the opposite result appears when the exit becomes wider. At a high stimulation level, the effect of exit location on flow of mice tends to be weakened. The results suggest that the specific level of stimulation needs to be taken into account when optimizing the evacuation efficiency of a crowd through the geometrical structure of a room.