High-rise Building Evacuation Research Articles

Understanding human-obstacle interaction dynamics on staircases: Implications for emergency evacuation and fire safety in high-rise buildings

Interactions between system components, including human-obstacle, human-building, human-robot, and human-human, significantly impact public safety, system efficiency, and functionality. A deeper understanding of these systems is essential to enhance their resilience and effectiveness. Despite the significance of these interactions, empirical research is limited, particularly regarding behavioral mechanisms when interacting with obstacles on stairways. Our study examines the evacuation behavior of 90 evacuees on the staircase of a high-rise building under different temporary obstacle conditions to understand how key factors affect decision-making and motion behavior during stairway descent. The experiments considered obstacle shapes as control variables and analyzed evacuation time, inner and outer stair route choices, regional speed fluctuations, velocity-relative displacement, evacuation efficiency, and biomechanical analysis of occupants’ comfort. Results show that larger obstacle shapes, increased evacuation urgency time, and closer proximity to the wall lead to a higher proportion of the splitting to merging state before and after obstacle interaction. A strong inner stair route preference emerges in no-obstacle conditions, with significant mean speed differences in downward movements when encountering temporary obstacle. Three phases of average speed variations are observed: deceleration, acceleration, and continued deceleration for the outer route; and deceleration followed by uniform speed for the inner route. A method was developed to calculate regional speed fluctuation using average speeds from trajectories. Comfort analysis revealed that temporary obstacle on building stairways significantly impact safe evacuation. Overall, these findings enhance the understanding of crowd dynamics in high-rise building emergency evacuations, with implications for model development, architectural design, building operations, emergency preparedness, behavioral cognition, and fire safety.

Evacuation safety assessment in corridor-type high-rise building under fires

This study aims to elucidate the characteristics of personnel evacuation in corridor-type high-rise building under fires and to assess their evacuation performance. Utilizing Building EXODUS software, the study simulated the evacuation behavior of occupants, particularly focusing on the impact of corridor structures on the building's fire evacuation capabilities. A performance evaluation model was developed, which incorporates factors such as building conditions and natural environments. This model employs an enhanced Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) combined with Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to an Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) analysis for more accurate assessment. The findings reveal that traditional evacuation performance assessment methods, which often overlook the impacts of corridor location, time of day, and illumination conditions, are not adequately suited for the evaluation of evacuation performance in corridor-type high-rise building under fires. Under similar external conditions, the evacuation time for buildings with connecting corridors is significantly shorter than that for conventional high-rise buildings, showing reductions of 25.0 %–34.0 % at the same time of day and 26.0 %–37.8 % under the same illumination conditions. Additionally, nighttime evacuations are 29.4 % longer than those conducted during daytime. The implementation of a layered evacuation strategy reduces evacuation time by 9.7 % compared with free evacuation methods. The enhanced model proposed in this study provides a more effective framework for assessing the evacuation performance of corridor-type high-rise buildings.

Optimizing phased-evacuation strategy for high-rise buildings in fire

Evacuation in high-rise buildings is a critical safety issue due to multiple floors and high occupant density. Phased evacuation strategies can mitigate this challenge. This research focuses on developing optimal phased evacuation strategies to enhance occupant safety during high-rise building fires. The study demonstrates these strategies in a 25-story building, housing 2400 individuals, across various scenarios. To simulate fire and smoke development, a two-zone model is employed to analyze behavior within the building. Pedestrian evacuation scenarios are simulated using Pathfinder and a mathematical model, providing insights into individual movements and congestion during evacuation to analyze different phased evacuation strategies. Findings underscore the importance of smoke flow and pedestrian motion in optimizing phased evacuation strategies. The modeling results show that implementing the optimal strategy can lead to a 65 % reduction in staircase congestion time. This study provides a quantitative analysis of high-rise building fires, considering dynamic fire and evacuation evolution. It emphasizes the importance of phased evacuation strategies and advocates for their real-life application. This research enhances the understanding of high-rise building evacuations to improve safety measures and provides a robust framework for optimizing evacuation strategies by integrating fire modeling. This study demonstrates the effectiveness of phased evacuation and paves the way for future applications to ensure occupant safety in fire emergencies.

Crowd management employing nudge theory for safe elevator use by people with mobility limitations during a high-rise building evacuation

Many countries have implemented regulations or guidance concerning the use of elevators solely for people with mobility limitations for evacuation during fires. However, there is uncertainty regarding whether people without disabilities may want to use the elevators during an emergency, which could lead to inoperability of the elevators or crowd accidents. This research conceptualized a nudge solution that can reduce the undesirable motivation of people without disabilities to try to use elevators solely for people with mobility limitations. The solution is based on an ordinary phased-evacuation strategy and was assessed experimentally. Twenty-five participants who were fire safety professionals were gathered in a 47th-floor meeting room of a 50-story building. They were instructed to evacuate to the nearest staircase/elevator lobby where a wheelchair user was waiting for rescue by elevator. The participants were immersed in four virtual cases that replicated the evacuation behavior of other people without disabilities in the actual lobby. The results showed that reducing the queuing and wait time in the lobby by phased evacuation can reduce the motivation of people without disabilities to use the elevator. An ordinary phased-evacuation for crowd management can also contribute to safe elevator use by people with mobility limitations.

Optimizing safe evacuation using pathfinder: emergency strategies in high-rise and super high-rise complex buildings in the new administrative capital

ABSTRACT Recently, the Egyptian government has sought to create new urban spots. The New Administrative Capital was one of those new urban extensions. Architects and urban designers tended to vertical expansion in planning this city as a result of the high cost of the land. Accordingly, high-rise and super-high-rise buildings have been relied upon in the architectural design of the buildings. This study aims to evaluate the achievement of safe occupants’ evacuation in case of fire for two high-rise and one super high-rise complex buildings based on a set of variables. Staircase design, the use of elevators, and the provision of refuge areas were evaluated, through simulating seven scenarios using Pathfinder software. The simulation results comprised an assessment of average stairs traffic jams, the occupant load density on emergency stairs, and the required safe evacuation time (RSET) for each scenario. It was concluded from the study that staircase design has a significant impact on (RSET) time. As well as, evacuation using elevators or relaying on refuge areas as auxiliary means with the emergency stairs may be safer for these types of buildings. Finally, the study provided technical requirements for using refuge areas and elevators in emergency evacuation in high-rise and super high-rise buildings.

A novel data-driven triangular-type staircase layout design in personnel safety evacuation in high-rise buildings

When an accident or crisis occurs in a high-rise building, evacuation by stairs is the most recognized safe evacuation method, where the design of stair layouts greatly impacts the economy and safety of high-rise buildings. Therefore, an economical and reasonable staircase layout design is especially important. Most previous studies tend to reduce the number of evacuation routes due to economic considerations alone, which is an unreasonable unilateral consideration. In this sense, a reasonable staircase layout should consider economic and evacuation efficiency. To address this issue, this study proposes a new evacuation time calculation model, which is then combined with an economic model to develop a bi-objective optimization model. After that, a set of solutions that achieve different trade-offs between economy and safety are obtained, allowing for a staircase arrangement that meets safety requirements while minimizing economic investment. Finally, the feasibility of the proposed model is verified by a real case study, where the Pareto front surface is obtained to facilitate decision-making for stakeholders with different risk preferences. The numerical results also allow decision-makers to make informed decisions considering both economics and safety in stairway settings.

Modeling of emergency evacuation in high rise buildings considering congestion at stairs based on Markov chains

High-rise buildings are vulnerable to encountering fires or other emergencies at any time, requiring an immediate evacuation of occupants. In the context of building evacuations, various engineering parameters are often utilized to evaluate the time required for people to reach a safe place when descending a staircase. A discrete-time Markov chain model is proposed to evaluate the evacuation time of the occupants in such circumstances by taking into consideration factors like merging at the stairs and congestion on the floor. Based on the congestion probabilities with respect to the number of evacuees in the building and other human behavior factors that slow down the rate of evacuation, non-congested and congested scenarios are evaluated. The effect of the critical parameters that influenced the evacuation process in the high-rise building, such as walking speed, number of evacuees, and effective stair width, is evaluated in both scenarios. The findings indicate an optimal evacuation speed of 0.7–1.4 m/s. The effective width of the stair is suggested to be between 1.6 and 2.4 m using the model. The simulation results are in good accordance with the SFPE method, the NIST egress simulator, and the agent-based model results.

Simulation study on fire and evacuation of super high-rise commercial building

The construction of high-rise and multi-functional commercial buildings has emerged as a global trend, but it also introduces significant fire hazards. Consequently, there is a pressing need to examine the fire development trends in super high-rise commercial buildings and establish logical evacuation strategies. This study utilizes the Pyrosim program to simulate a typical fire scenario at the Yangtze River International Conference Center, allowing for the acquisition of essential fire parameters and available evacuation time. Subsequently, based on the complex functional zones and personnel distribution within the building, appropriate evacuation plans are devised and simulated using the Pathfinder software. The results reveal that by effectively utilizing stairs, elevators, and refuge floors in accordance with personnel distribution, evacuation efficiency can be substantially enhanced. Furthermore, the required evacuation time during nighttime fires is merely 36.6%–55.3% compared to unorganized evacuation. The findings of this study offer valuable theoretical guidance for the evacuation of super high-rise commercial buildings, holding immense significance in minimizing fire-related casualties within such structures.

Simulation and optimization of hybrid evacuation model for high-rise building under emergency condition

With the characteristics of high-speed transportation, the elevator has an overwhelmingly crucial meaning footnote in an auxiliary evacuation high-rise building with more than 30 floors causing the time to be the deciding factor under the emergency condition. The study shows that using the stairway or elevator separately cannot achieve the best effect. The elevator’s evacuation time depends on the number of occupants on each floor and the elevator’s carrying capacity. This paper discusses how to use the stair and elevator to optimize the hybrid evacuation in high-rise buildings and proposes two goals for the evacuation model of high-rise buildings under emergency conditions. One is that both the last occupant to use the stairway and the last occupant to use the elevator reach the safe place simultaneously. The other is that we fine-tune the evacuation destinations of the occupants to balance the utilization of each evacuation path as much as possible. We present the optimization method with three steps, and the evacuation time shrunk by up to 57% according to the baseline. Finally, we compare the optimized hybrid evacuation and the single evacuation method to the previous work and give the results of the experiments.

고층 공동주택용 보급형 승강식피난기의 피난효과 분석

This evacuation mechanism features a new technology evacuation mechanism with a universal design that is ’safe, simple and repeatable’ and easy to use for people with disabilities. An elevator evacuation machine is a rescue evacuation device in which the evacuee climbs on the platform and lowers the user’s weight by 1 floor when the button is bright. Because it evacuates one floor by floor, it is suitable as a high-rise evacuation mechanism. In addition, it is possible to use non-motorized power outages due to fire.BR The study confirmed the performance of the new technology elevator evacuator as a field test to confirm its efficiency when used for evacuation of high-rise buildings. The field test measured the time it took for a family of 4 living in a 33-story communal house to evacuate to the evacuation safe zone below the 10th floor. The evacuation was analyzed for the time it took for 4 people to evacuate 10 floors using stairs and elevator evacuations. It took about 100 seconds for a family of 4 to use the evacuation stairs, and 440 seconds for the elevator evacuation machine. In evacuation time, the lift evacuation period takes about 4 times longer. However, as a countermeasure in cases where the stairs are blocked by smoke and are difficult to use, evacuation using an elevator evacuator has confirmed the great responsibility. The evacuation time for a family of 4 on the 10th floor took about 8 minutes, confirming that it was safe enough.BR Currently, the fire protection law excludes the installation of evacuation equipment on the 11th floor or above. This is to prepare for safety accidents that occur during evacuation from high-rises. The elevator evacuator developed with the new technology can be applied regardless of the height of the building by dividing it into 1 floor and evacuating in the downward direction, It is hoped that in the fire objects of cities where high-rise normalization has become commonplace, elevator-type evacuators will be introduced as high-rise evacuation equipment and become an evacuation mechanism to protect the safety of the people.

Investigation of elevator-aided evacuation strategies for older people in high-rise elderly housing

Staircase evacuation is the major means of fire evacuation for current high-rise residential buildings. However, its feasibility may be questioned as the increasing aging population and many recent constructions of elderly community estates comprising high-rise apartment buildings. The weakness in physical strength and mobility impairment of older people may impede the successful implementation of staircase evacuation. Therefore, it is reasonable to consider facilitating older people's evacuation with elevators, shorted as elevator-aided evacuation (EAE). In order to find the most appropriate EAE strategy for high-rise elderly housing evacuation, three possbile strategy modes for EAE are proposed: horizontally rationed EAE (S1), vertically rationed EAE (S2), and refuge floor gathered EAE (S3). Using evacuation simulation to examine evacuation efficiencies of these proposed strategy modes varying in different evacuation scenarios, we find that S2 is appropriate for middle high-rise building (12 & 24 stories) evacuation; S3 is suitable for ultra high-rise building (36 & 48 stories) evacuation with a low occupants' density per floor; S1 is the most preferable for evacuation of ultra high-rise buildings (36 & 48 stories) with a high occupants' density per floor. More importantly, the ratio of occupants assigned to use elevators and stairs for evacuation needs to be regulated according to the occupancy information. Thus, a smart elevator-aided building fire evacuation scheme is suggested, which aims to determine the optimal EAE strategy according to the real-time on-site situation.

Yüksek Binaların Tahliye Etkinliğinin İncelenmesi: Gaziantep Ek Adliye Binası Örneği

Binaların tahliye analizinde en gerçekçi metot tahliye tatbikatlarıdır. Fakat bu metot özellikle yüksek kullanıcı yüküne sahip binalarda bazı fiziki riskler taşımaktadır. Gelişen teknolojiyle birlikte bilgisayar tabanlı benzetim çalışmaları, birçok alanda olduğu gibi tahliye analizlerinde de geniş yer almaya başlamıştır. Bu makalede, ön tanımlı metotla test edilmiş ve onaylanmış olan ve Türkiye İmar Yönetmeliğine göre yüksek yapı sınıfında bulunan Gaziantep Ek Adliye Binasının tahliye etkinliği incelenmiştir. Benzetim modelleri oluşturulurken kullanılan metotlardan ön tanımlı ve performans tabanlı metotları inceleyen bu çalışmada, Gaziantep Ek Adliye Binası, performans tabanlı modele göre ve uluslararası tanımlara göre, Pathfinder benzetim programıyla test edilmiştir. Elde edilen sonuçlara göre binanın, National Fire Protection Association tarafından belirlenen kullanıcı yüküne göre 45 dk 35 sn’de, yazarlar tarafından binanın normal bir gündeki normal yüküne yönelik oluşturulan tahmini kullanıcı yüküne göre ise 18 dk 50 sn’de tahliye edildiği görülmüştür. Ayrıca yüksek binaların tasarımında etkin tahliyeye izin verecek tasarım detaylarından bahsedilmiştir.

Evaluation of crowd evacuation in high-rise residential buildings with mixed-ability population: combining an architectural solution with management strategies

The increasing growth of high-rise residential buildings in recent years and the existence of hazards such as fires, earthquakes, and terrorist incidents have increased the importance of evacuating buildings to save lives. Meanwhile, statistics show that a significant percentage of the population and hence residents of buildings are permanently disabled. However, the study of the evacuation of a mixed-ability population is more complicated than a homogeneous population. This study examined phased evacuation, emplacement strategy, and ramp installation using a mixed-ability population simulation in a 26-story residential building. The study population includes 2% of people with mobility limitations and 98% without disabilities. Unlike previous studies, the results revealed that phased evacuation could not reduce evacuation time in a mixed-ability population. It was also found that emplacement strategies could shorten the evacuation time by up to 10%, though suffering from an ethical problem. Meanwhile, combining ramp installation with others strategies offered the best and broadest impact on a safe evacuation and could improve evacuation time by up to 30% and reduce congestion on exit routes.

Towards a Smart Elevator-Aided Fire Evacuation Scheme in High-Rise Apartment Buildings for Elderly

Staircase evacuation is the major means of fire evacuation for current high-rise residential buildings. However, its feasibility may be questioned as more and more senior citizens live there in the future. The weakness in physical strength and mobility impairment of elderly people may impede the successful implementation of staircase evacuation. It is therefore reasonable to consider using elevators for overall evacuation in high-rise residential buildings. However, enhancing the fire protection of elevators and efficiently controlling the elevator-aided evacuation operations are two major difficulties for applying elevators in building fire evacuation. Recently, the use of smart control for building facility management has become a hot issue in built environment studies. An enabling solution for smart elevator-aided building fire evacuation (SEABFE) is proposed in this article. The solution supports the SEABFE by determining the safer and more efficient elevator-aided evacuation strategy based on real-time fire ground and evacuation progress on the scene. A simulated case study of fire evacuation in a typical high-rise residential building shows that the proposed SEABFE can be successfully performed. Apart from keeping the elevator operation safe, the planned elevator-aided evacuation strategy may save 38.0% of the time compared with the strategy using only staircases in the scene.

Performance of occupant evacuation in a super high-rise building up to 583 m

The stairwell is the main evacuation channel of super high-rise buildings, so revealing the evacuation characteristics on stairs in such buildings based on a full-scale experiment is critical for safer evacuation. However, currently there are few studies focusing on the evacuation performance of crowd in such buildings, especially for the collective movement scenarios. Here, an evacuation experiment is carried out in Shanghai Tower with a vertical height of 583 m, which is the second tallest building in the world. The evacuation speeds for 69 participants in 58 stair sections are extracted and the effects of travel distance, gender, age and density on descent speeds are analyzed and discussed. According to the result that the group of participants with a 9.63% higher travel height spends a 16.39% longer evacuation time, yet within each group the speed does not decrease with the increase of the moving distance, we propose an interesting hypothesis that the travel distance may affect descent speed, but it needs to be further verified. The speeds of the female are significantly lower than those of the male and the female are more sensitive to the increase of travel distance. At the same time, younger participants show better evacuation ability than the older ones, including that they evacuate faster and are less affected by the confluence. Furthermore, a new method is proposed to calculate density and the fundamental diagram These results are useful for the validation and calibration of related evacuation models, and can provide basic data for the design of emergency evacuation facilities in super high-rise buildings.

Optimal solutions to vertical access placement design in residential high-rise buildings based on human behavior

Human behavior at the time of building crisis should be analyzed in order to design buildings with satisfactory performance. In residential high-rise buildings, there are certain complications due to residential conditions. Given the high population density of these buildings, it is important to analyze their vertical access performance for emergency evacuations. This study aims to find the optimal placement and layout of vertical access in residential high-rise buildings. It asks: What is the most optimal solution to vertical access placement design in residential high-rise buildings? To answer this, human behavior simulation models during an emergency evacuation in residential high-rise buildings were first analyzed, and the best model was selected. Based on the human behavior models, the vertical access placement was then optimized to evaluate the optimal structures of four types of 60-story residential buildings designed and compared in SFPE and Steering simulation engines. The scenarios differ in vertical access placement. The simulations are conducted in four parts, which include how people placement on each floor, considering disabled persons along with assisted evacuation, and the fire-involved stories and the blocked stairs. According to the research results, a cost-effective core that solves structural problems and provides vertical access will not necessarily be the right solution to the emergency evacuation of high-rise buildings. Instead, placing vertical access features such as stairs and elevators on two opposite sides of a building plan can reduce the total evacuation time by 20%.

High-Rise Building Evacuation Simulation Based on Physical Stamina of Evacuees

Currently, high-rise buildings are being continuously constructed, and thus, it is necessary to predict evacuation safety in advance in case of emergency situations in high-rise buildings. However, current studies focus only on the movement of individuals in evacuation situations for predicting the final evacuation time. Therefore, in this study, a simulation of realistic evacuation in high-rise buildings was performed based on characteristics such as the physical stamina of evacuees. The evacuation simulation was performed on the world's tallest high-rise building, Burj Khalifa, and comparative verification was performed with and without consideration of the physical stamina of evacuees. The results of the simulation indicated that the total evacuation time significantly increases when physical stamina is considered. Hence, realistic evacuation in high-rise buildings is possible when the stamina of evacuees is considered.

In whose best interests? Regulating childcare environments in Australia

This conceptual model paper uses systems theory to explain how key elements in the Australian policy and regulatory context lead to three issues of concern in childcare centre physical environments: siting of centres on busy roads; lack of outdoor space; and, emergency evacuation in high-rise buildings. Drawing on evidence from prior studies and policy documents through desktop research, as well as childcare centre visits and communications with stakeholders and experts, we confirmed these issues as threats to children’s health, safety, development and well-being. Adapting Goekler’s ‘iceberg model’ of systems theory, we identified a dominance of commercial childcare property interests and complex and conflicting policy and regulatory structures, as explanatory elements leading to outcomes that conflict with children’s best interests.

Effectiveness of travel time during evacuation in high-rise residential buildings: a case study in Selangor, Malaysia

PurposeIn recent years, the number of high-rise buildings in Malaysia has been increasing. Therefore, it is essential to take evacuation into consideration especially for emergency conditions such as fire, explosion and natural disasters. This research aims to evaluate the effectiveness of the escape time in typical Malaysian high-rise residential buildings.Design/methodology/approachThis work comprises simulation on three buildings around the Selangor area in Malaysia. Quantitative methodology is adopted using Pathfinder software to simulate the evacuation process and time of the three typical Malaysian high-rise residential buildings. Four parameters were studied namely, the occupant load density, walking speed of first and last occupants, average of evacuation time per floor for the three buildings and effect of placement of emergency staircase on travel time.FindingsFindings show that 12 m2 which is double the allowable occupants' density in Malaysia increases evacuation time by 67.9% while the placement of the emergency staircase on the left and middle section of a building significantly affects the evacuation time by 21.2%. In conclusion, from the simulation studies, it is recognized that a higher occupant's density affects the evacuation time.Originality/valueThis work could provide information on escape time for future construction of high-rise buildings in Malaysia. Hence, the specification and design of buildings could be reviewed based on the results obtained from this simulation. This information could be beneficial to the building regulators and developers thus enhancing the knowledge of building constructor and possible issues in the design of staircases, corridors and height of buildings.

Fire Safety in High-Rise Buildings: Is the Stay-Put Tactic a Misjudgement or Magnificent Strategy?

Historically, fire incidents in high-rise buildings reveal that Fire and Rescue Services frequently rely on the stay-put tactic (i.e., occupants of high-rise buildings should remain in their apartments) during an inferno. Recent fire occurrences in high-rise buildings reveal that there are two opposing viewpoints on the stay-put tactic. First, the understanding that the stay-put tactic is a beneficial practice used to protect, control, and facilitate smooth evacuation of occupants during fire incidents. Second, the argument that the stay-put tactic is a misjudgement and futile strategy that leads to fatalities, particularly in high-rise buildings. The aim of this study was to provide awareness and understanding of fire and rescue services use of the stay-put tactic in high-rise buildings. We attempted to answer the questions: is the stay-put tactic a misjudgement or magnificent strategy? The study adopted phenomenological research strategies with various focus groups consisting of seasoned firefighters and survivors with first-hand accounts of stay-put instructions in high-rise buildings. The study also scrutinised three case studies of fire incidents in high-rise buildings in two countries. The study revealed that the stay-put tactic is obsolete; with the potential to cause catastrophic misjudgement, mostly during conflagrations in high-rise buildings. There is a need to advance research on the use of artificial intelligence communication systems and infrared image detectors camera to enhance quick and smooth fire evacuation in high-rise buildings.