Evacuation Time Research Articles

Experiment and path optimization on Large-Space Multi-Area crowd evacuation

Abstract In large spaces where there are multiple evacuation zones, the flow patterns during evacuation are intricate, leading to congestion in emergency scenarios, and affecting evacuation efficiency. To address this, we proposed an optimization method for crowd evacuation paths in large-space multi-area environment settings under fire scenarios by utilizing multi-agent simulation. Using Pathfinder software, disorganized evacuation simulations are conducted within expansive multi-zonal settings to pinpoint areas with inadequate evacuation capabilities. Subsequent evacuation experiments are performed for verification, facilitating adjustments to agent-based model parameters for evacuees in fire scenarios, and carrying out organized evacuation simulations. Through meticulous simulation analysis, we aim to optimize the most efficient evacuation paths under organized responses in large-space multi-area settings. Results indicate that in emergency conditions due to fire, the evacuation speeds reach 1.8 m/s, and significant reductions in total evacuation time are achieved through simulation optimization, with the time required for the slowest individuals to evacuate decreasing from 240.32 s to 209.32 s. Furthermore, the flow rate per second at congested exits diminishes from 2.01 persons/s to 1.39 persons/s, highlighting the efficacy of the proposed path optimization method.

Comparative Study of SFPE and Steering Modes in Pathfinder to Optimise Evacuation Routes

This paper investigates the possibilities of using an agent-based evacuation model to analyse the formation of queues at the exits of enclosed spaces and the evacuation process of people. The aim is to investigate how the density of people in a crowd affects the safe movement of people and how the width, number, and location of exits affect evacuation time. The analysis was carried out using the Pathfinder evacuation model, which provides two modes to simulate the movement of people: steering and SFPE. An enclosed space of 20 m × 30 m was investigated. First, the differences between the modes of the evacuation model to simulate the movement of people were compared. Then, the steering mode with limited door flow was set and the effect of the width, number, and location of the exits with a total width of 4 m on the evacuation time was investigated. The results of this study highlight differences in the simulation of the movement of people according to the different modes and provide valuable information for the design of safe escape routes. Proper design of escape routes can prevent an adverse situation that could arise when evacuating a large number of people.

Optimization of emergency evacuation in complex rail transit station

Post-earthquake fires in populated stations pose a significant threat to passenger safety, necessitating the implementation of efficient emergency evacuation procedures to adequately safeguard lives and property. Utilizing Building Information Modeling (BIM) and Pathfinder, this study innovatively delves into the emergency evacuation optimization measures under a post-earthquake fire. Three pivotal research questions are explored: a comparative analysis of the Required Safe Egress Time (RSET) versus the Available Safe Egress Time (ASET) to evaluate the safety of evacuation procedures; a focused examination of critical time points and influential factors during evacuation process; and the formulation of optimization measures to enhance evacuation efficiency. The Beijing Xiyuan rail transit station was chosen as a case study, with four post-earthquake fire scenarios simulated. Additionally, the impact of obstacles and injured personnel resulting from the earthquake was considered. The results show that: (1) During evacuations, critical issues arise at specific time points. The entrances of escalators/stairs, turnstiles, and exits are key sites, where congestion becomes critical issues. (2) Evacuating rescue personnel through public non-paid areas saves 9.1 % of the evacuation time compares to crossing turnstiles. (3) The most impactful measures for optimizing evacuation is that trains arrive in only one direction, followed by the deployment of evacuation guidance. Thus, key control time points and optimization measures for the evacuation process of complex urban rail transit stations can be obtained. The findings provide insights and guidance for optimizing emergency evacuation in rail transit stations to mitigate post-earthquake fire risks and ensure public safety.

The Collection and Compilation of Small Group Data for Scenario Setting of Simulations and Experiments

The influence of small groups in evacuation cannot be ignored. However, the current simulations and experimental studies have oversimplified the settings of small groups and evacuation scenarios. A significant disparity exists between the findings of existing studies and real-world scenarios. This paper compiled data on the number and size of small groups and the location of small group members in built environments. Subsequently, a scenario with intricate functions and shapes was established, and finally, these data was employed in agent-based simulations. The data encompassed 50 small groups comprising a total of 111 members. These groups, ranging from 2 to 4 members each, exhibited spatial separations between members spanning from 1 m to 23 m. Simulation outcomes indicated a detrimental effect of small groups on overall evacuation. A significant and positive correlation was observed between the distance separating small group members and the escalation in evacuation time, total jam time, and evacuation distance. The data provides a foundation for configuring initial scenarios in small group evacuation experiments and simulations. The simulation results can provide a basis for hospital safety evacuation management.

Time from injury to operative intervention in traumatic intracranial hematoma: A systematic literature review and meta-analysis.

The outcomes in traumatic intracranial hematoma (TICH) have not improved significantly despite advances in trauma care. A modifiable factor in TICH management is time to operation room (TOR). TOR has become a key marker in Traumatic brain injury care despite a lack of contemporary evidence. This study aimed to determine the timing of TICH evacuation and its association with mortality and neurological outcomes. A systematic review of PubMed, OVID MEDLINE, CINAHL, and Web of Science. Included studies reported data on adult patients with acute TICH who underwent surgical evacuation. The primary outcome was TOR and its association with mortality or functional neurological recovery. From 1838 articles screened, 17 were included. Eight studies reported TOR as a continuous variable, ranging between 3 and 7.1h. Three studies found better outcomes with shorter TOR, five found no difference, and one found worse outcomes with shorter TOR. Five articles were included in meta-analysis of mortality in patients undergoing operative decompression less than or greater than 4h from injury which found lower mortality in the >4-h group, OR=1.53. Longitudinal regression analysis showed no difference in TOR over the 33-year span of articles included. There is limited data available on TOR in TICH, with equivocal results on the effect of timing on outcomes. TOR has not decreased over the last 4decades. The unvalidated 4-h cut-off seems to be associated with better survival. Contemporary assessment of this potentially important performance indicator is required.

Simulation and Risk Assessment of Flood Disaster at the Entrance to a Rail Transit Station under Extreme Weather Conditions—A Case Study of Wanqingsha Station of Guangzhou Line 18

With the rapid development of urbanization and underground transportation, as well as the frequent occurrence of extreme weather conditions such as extreme rainfall, flooding disasters for rail transit are becoming severe, and need to be urgently clarified in terms of the mechanism causing them. In this study, a comprehensive model for water damage at the entrance to a rail transit station is proposed, emphasizing the entire process of extreme weather–surface ponding–underground intrusion. The model is validated by the inundation process of Line 5 of the Zhengzhou Metro during the “7.20” event and further applied to Wanqingsha Station of Guangzhou Metro Line 18 in China to determine the surrounding water depth, distribution, total water inflow volume, and water damage time under different rainfall intensities, rain patterns and protection scenarios. It was found that when rainfall reaches the level of a 1-in-2000-years event, the surface water begins to invade the internal rail transit system through the rail transit entrances. When facing extreme rainfall akin to the “7.20” event in Zhengzhou, the rail transit system in Wanqingsha Station meets a heightened risk of water damage, resulting in significantly deeper water levels compared to 1-in-5000-year rainfall event in Guangzhou and exceeds the height of the subway entrances. Analysis of the water intrusion process reveals that, as rainfall intensity escalates, the total inflow water volume into the rail transit system increases while escape time diminishes. Moreover, under identical rainfall intensity, pre-type rainfall yields the highest total water inflow, whereas mid-type rainfall exhibits the shortest escape time. Enhancing the protection conditions can markedly attenuate surface water intrusion into the subterranean rail transit system, thereby enhancing the evacuation time for individuals within the system.

Evacuation dynamics of pedestrians passing through a low-boundary exit in the context of sound signal

Previous studies indicate that congestion is more likely to occur in the exit restriction area. Besides the background music in public places may have a potential impact on pedestrian movement. However, the influence mechanisms of low-boundary exit and background music on pedestrian evacuation are still unclear. Therefore, in this paper, the evacuation characteristics of pedestrians at a low-boundary exit were investigated with a series of controlled experiments. Different commands (listening to music while walking and following the tempo of the music) and different types of music (music and metronome) were designed in the experiment to analyze the influence of sound signal on the evacuation process. The result indicates that a larger width of low-boundary exit leads to a shorter evacuation time. The flow of low-boundary exit is higher than that of high-boundary exit. In addition, it is found that sound signal has a negative effect on evacuation efficiency, and the influence level is varied with different commands and music types. Specifically, the flow of following the beat of music is lower than that of listening to music, while the flow of walking with the beat of metronome is higher than that of walking with the beat of music. This study can contribute to understanding the evacuation dynamics of pedestrians when passing through a low-boundary exit. Furthermore, the performance of sound signal can be useful to develop management strategies for pedestrians under the emergency evacuation.

СТРУКТУРНАЯ СХЕМА СИСТЕМЫ ИНТЕЛЛЕКТУАЛЬНОГО УПРАВЛЕНИЯ ЭВАКУАЦИЕЙ

In an emergency, such as a fire or a terrorist attack, an important aspect is the safe evacuation of people. The unpredictability of the situation makes the task of emergency evacuation one of the main problems. The development of artificial intelligence technologies opens up possible promising ways of developing evacuation management systems. An intelligent evacuation management system can help track the movement and coordinates of people and related critical factors during the evacuation process (for example, slowing down traffic along the paths, blocking the paths, etc.). The study is devoted to the construction of a decision support system for the evacuation of people from buildings based on the results of modeling the development of a fire, intelligent forecasting of the evacuation time in the conditions of the current situation during a fire. The system allows dynamically forming optimal evacuation routes in a changing situation. The proposed results allow us to further move on to the development of an automated intelligent evacuation management system, which will ensure increased safety for evacuees, regardless of evacuation scenarios and the current situation in the building.

Who needs a tourniquet? And who does not? Lessons learned from a review of tourniquet use in the Russo-Ukrainian war.

Extremity tourniquets have proven to be lifesaving in both civilian and military settings and should continue to be used by first responders for trauma patients with life-threatening extremity bleeding. This is especially true in combat scenarios in which both the casualty and the first responder may be confronted by the imminent threat of death from hostile fire as the extremity hemorrhage is being treated. Not every extremity wound, however, needs a tourniquet. One of the most important aspects of controlling life-threatening extremity bleeding with tourniquets is to recognize what magnitude of bleeding requires this intervention and what magnitude of bleeding does not. Multiple studies, both military and civilian, have shown that tourniquets are often applied when they are not medically indicated. Overuse of extremity tourniquets has not caused excess morbidity in either the recent conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan or in the US urban civilian setting. In the presence of prolonged evacuation, however, applying a tourniquet when it is not medically indicated changes tourniquet application from being a lifesaving intervention to one that may cause an avoidable amputation and the development of an array of metabolic derangements and acute kidney injury collectively called prolonged tourniquet application syndrome. The recent literature was reviewed for papers that documented the complications of tourniquet use resulting from the prolonged casualty evacuation times being seen in the current Russo-Ukrainian war. The literature was also reviewed for the incidence of tourniquet application that was found to not be medically indicated, in both the US civilian setting and from Ukraine. Finally, an in-person meeting of the US/Ukraine Tourniquet Working Group was held in Warsaw, Poland, in December of 2023. Unnecessary loss of extremities and life-threatening episodes of prolonged tourniquet application syndrome are currently occurring in Ukrainian combat forces because of nonindicated tourniquet use combined with the prolonged evacuation time seen in the Russo-Ukrainian war. Specific numbers of the complications experienced as a result of tourniquet use by Ukrainian forces in the current conflict are treated as classified information and are not available, but multiple sources from the Ukrainian military medical personnel and from the US advisors providing medical assistance to Ukraine have all agreed that the problem is substantial. Unnecessary tourniquet morbidity might also occur in US forces in a variety of potential future combat scenarios in which evacuation to surgical care is delayed. Prehospital trauma training programs, including but not limited to tactical combat casualty care, place insufficient emphasis on the need to avoid leaving tourniquets in place when they are not medically indicated. This aspect of training should receive emphasis in future Tactical Combat Casualty Care (TCCC) and civilian first responder curriculum development. An interim ad hoc training solution on this topic is available at the websites noted in this articles. Additional training modalities may follow in the near future. Therapeutic/Care Management; Level V.

Vacuum-assisted headspace-solid phase microextraction of pesticides in grape samples

Vacuum-assisted headspace solid-phase microextraction (Vac-HS-SPME) could provide an alternative for extracting pesticides from grape samples. Vac-HS-SPME method is utilized to the simultaneous analysis of six pesticides from various classes, namely boscalid, quizalofop-p-methyl, oxyfluorfen, fluroxypyr-meptyl, metribuzin and epoxiconazole. In this study investigated and optimized the impact of independent variables, such as extraction temperature, extraction time, fiber coating, incubation time, salt effect, sample volume, air evacuation time, pH, desorption time with the objective of achieving lower detection limits (ranging from 0.11 to 0.61 µg mL-1) and effective analyte responses. Moreover, in this work a comparison was made between classical solid phase microextraction and vacuum-assisted solid phase microextraction for the extraction of pesticides in grape samples under the same parameters. The results clearly demonstrated that the combination of Vac-HS-SPME proved to be more appropriate and selective for the extraction of pesticides from grape samples.

Analysis of fire protection design strategies for commercial renovation of villagers’ self-built houses

Abstract The current situation of self-built houses by villagers is prevalent in rural areas, where many villagers construct their own residential dwellings based on their personal needs and economic circumstances. These self-built houses are typically constructed using basic materials and traditional building techniques, often without adherence to strict building regulations and standards. As a result of the lack of professional knowledge and technical guidance, the structural integrity and safety of these houses are often compromised. In addition, the lack of firefighting facilities and fire prevention measures further increase the risk of fire accidents. This situation contributes to a higher incidence of fires in rural areas, posing a significant threat to the lives and assets of villagers. Therefore, it becomes imperative to improve the current state of self-built houses by villagers. Strengthening fire safety awareness and implementing robust fire prevention measures are vital in this regard. This paper aims to summarize the challenges involved in fire protection design for renovating rural buildings. Additionally, it proposes fire protection design principles specifically for the commercial transformation of self-built houses by villagers. By analyzing real-world engineering cases, this study puts forth specific fire protection measures concerning fire rescue, fire control zones (groups), evacuation design, and fire systems. To ensure the fire safety of these buildings, special fire protection design methods are employed. The effectiveness of the proposed fire protection measures are validated through the use of FDS fire and smoke numerical simulation analysis software and Pathfinder evacuation simulation software, ensuring the fire safety of the buildings. The results show that the available safe evacuation time that can be provided by this scenario is 1200 s as calculated by the FDS simulation, and the necessary safe evacuation time is less than the available safe evacuation time in case of a fire on the first floor of this building, and the safe evacuation of the people can be guaranteed. This study can provide a valuable resource for architects, engineers, and decision makers to implement effective fire protection measures during commercial remodeling of village-owned houses.

Quantitative Evaluation of Evacuation Efficiency during Disasters according to the Operation of Human Resources in Medical Facilities

Intensive care patients are among those most vulnerable during disasters, as they are unable to evacuate independently and often rank lowest in evacuation priority due to their low survival rates. Consequently, evacuation protocols in medical facilities prioritize patients with better survival prospects. However, quantitative research on whether such evacuation methods improve efficiency remains insufficient. This study utilized Flexsim Healthcare to calculate the Required Safe Evacuation Time for medical facilities accommodating patients with various evacuation needs, including those who are walkable, in a wheelchair, and bedridden. The findings indicate that the deployment of over 40% of resident nurses as per legal standards is necessary to significantly enhance the evacuation efficiency for vulnerable populations. Additionally, the study found that the highest evacuation efficiency is achieved when 75% of all evacuation assistants are assigned to bedridden patients and 25% to those in wheelchairs.

A Study on the Measurement of Walking Speed for Evacuation Safety in Postpartum Care Centers

Most postpartum care centers in Korea are located on the high floors of multi-use establishments and mixed use buildings; mothers in recovery after childbirth and newborns who cannot self-evacuate are the occupants of these centers. Walking speed is a necessary factor to be considered during occupant evacuation to predict evacuation time. Research is continuously being conducted on the walking speed of vulnerable persons, such as the elderly, disabled, and patients, who have relatively poor evacuation capacity. However, to date, no data exists on the walking speed of the occupants of postpartum care centers. Therefore, in this study, the walking speed was measured by categorizing the occupants of the postpartum care center into mothers alone, mothers + newborns, workers alone, and workers + newborns. The results showed an average speed of 0.95 m/s in the range of 0.73–1.12 m/s for the mothers alone and 0.68–1.03 m/s for the mothers + newborns, an average speed of 0.87 m/s in the range of 1.06–1.33 m/s for the workers alone, and an average speed of 1.18 m/s in the range of 0.95–1.29 m/s for the workers + newborns categories.

Multifactor dynamic coupled model for building fire evacuation: Case study of the Karamay Friendship Palace fire

Occupant evacuation during a building fire is a complex system that includes several highly coupled subsystems, such as building characteristics, occupant characteristics, fire behavior, and evacuation behavior. To study the interaction mechanism between these subsystems to maximize occupant safety during fire evacuation in a building, a multifactor dynamic coupled model based on the Fire Dynamic Simulator and floor field cellular automata model for occupant evacuation in a fire was established. In the model, the dynamic impact of smoke diffusion on occupant movement direction and speed, decrease in occupant health points caused by smoke and trampling, and changes in occupant exit choices in the presence of closed exits were considered in detail. The catastrophic fire accident in the Friendship Palace of Karamay, Xinjiang, China, in 1994 was used as the analysis case, in which the spatial model of the Friendship Palace was reconstructed according to real data and architectural design methods. The safety exits open or closed, radius Rtra, possibility of information transmission Psuc, and wait time twait were discussed to study the influence of these parameters on the evacuation process and results. The study shows that the model could reproduce a fire accident well with Rtra = 4, Psuc = 0.5, and twait = 30. The closed exits increased evacuation time by over 120.3 % and resulted in 439 deaths. These conclusions are important for providing better estimates, guiding architectural designs, and enhancing building safety management.

Multi-period human evacuation model for passenger ships under walking speed uncertainty

An effective evacuation model can steer passengers from unsafe zones to safety in a time-sensitive manner on passenger ships. The International Maritime Organization highly recommends constructing robust evacuation models rooted in understanding human behavior and ship design. This study addresses the challenge by focusing on walking speed, a key determinant of human behavior, the capacity of transitional points (e.g., exit stairs), and the distance of passengers to the exit stairs for a safe and rapid evacuation. This study presents a multi-period human evacuation model aimed at optimizing the evacuation time of the slowest passenger, identifying the optimal number of stairs, and planning route evacuation under passenger walking speed uncertainty affected by the heeling angle for a deck of a passenger ship.A robust optimization approach is also employed to manage uncertainty by defining uncertainty sets for passengers’ walking speeds. The computation of the price of robustness spans various test problems at various levels of conservatism. This research offers multiple managerial implications for maritime industry leaders, paving the way for more efficient evacuation planning.

Numerical simulation and safety assessment of fires in historic timber structures based on fire load investigation

Historic timber structures face substantial fire loads and complex fire risks. Subsequent renovations and utilization may influence their fire safety performance. Therefore, accurately predicting indoor fire development in historic buildings and assessing their fire safety performance is crucial. Numerical fire simulation is currently at the forefront of analyzing and assessing fire risks in historic buildings. However, there is a shortage of globally accessible historic building fire data. This paper proposes a method to determine fire scenarios, peak heat release rates, and development curves of indoor fires in wooden historic buildings through a fire load investigation. Using the Guangzhou ancestral hall as an example, PyroSim fire dynamics simulation software is employed to calculate fire development and assess the available safe evacuation time. The simulation results are subsequently input into the Pathfinder evacuation simulation software to ascertain the required safe evacuation time for indoor occupants. A comparative assessment is conducted to evaluate the fire safety performance before and after the renovation of historic buildings. The research findings indicate that installing closed glass curtain walls in the courtyards of ancestral hall buildings in Guangzhou accelerates the infiltration of smoke during fires, leading to rapid fire spread and long-distance ignition, significantly reducing the time available for safe evacuation. Therefore, when renovating and utilizing the ancestral hall buildings in Guangzhou, the installation of ventilation and smoke extraction systems should be prioritized to slow down fire development. Additionally, controlling the number of indoor occupants is an effective management measure to mitigate fire damage in historic buildings.

Analysis of the effect of obstacles on evacuation efficiency in emergencies

Congestion is one of the factors that affects evacuation efficiency in emergencies. In this study, we focus on shortening the total evacuation time (TET) by setting obstacles near the exit. For this purpose, we add a probability-based obstacle avoidance strategy to modify the original social force model to simulate pedestrians’ obstacle avoidance behaviour. Using the model, we analyse the influence of the number of obstacles, their position and their distance to the wall with the exit on the TET. In addition, we discuss the relationship between the average density at the exit and the TET, which shows that crowd diversion is an effective method to alleviate congestion and shorten the TET. The simulation results show that the evacuation efficiency can be improved by reasonably setting obstacles near the exit. This study can provide some guidance for the management of crowds during emergency evacuations.

Evacuation scenario optimization in buildings with human anthropometric characteristics

Emergency evacuations are critical situations that threaten people's lives and safety, necessitating robust planning and prevention strategies. Anthropometric data, which are numerical expressions of human body measurements, play a vital role in architectural design by helping determine safe evacuation routes. This data is crucial for understanding the physical characteristics and mobility of building occupants, allowing for optimized evacuation routes that accommodate the needs of various groups, such as the elderly, children, and individuals with physical disabilities. The Social Forces Model (SFM) is an important tool used to understand the behavior and movement of crowds, modeling these aspects mathematically by considering social interactions and environmental factors. This study develops a system to enhance emergency evacuation scenarios in buildings using anthropometric data and SFM. This system analyzes the evacuation process and identifies optimal routes, contributing significantly to ensuring safety and minimizing damage during disasters. The research shows that using anthropometric data and SFM in architectural design is essential for effective emergency evacuation planning and management. Simulations that incorporate the diverse physical characteristics of people demonstrate notable improvements in evacuation times compared to those using fixed values, with up to 10.20 % improvement in single-exit scenarios and up to 13.45 % in two-exit scenarios. Furthermore, evacuation routes are optimized using SFM, and histograms are employed to identify the most preferred routes during panic situations. This data-driven approach informs the design of building and floor layouts, as well as the materials and decorations used, ensuring that evacuation routes remain clear and accessible. Removing obstacles and facilitating easy passage during emergencies significantly enhances the effectiveness of evacuations. Overall, the integration of anthropometric data and SFM in building design is shown to create faster and safer evacuation processes, ultimately improving emergency response and safety.

Time to traumatic intracranial hematoma evacuation: contemporary standard and room for improvement.

Traumatic intracranial hematoma (TICH) is a neurosurgical emergency with high mortality and morbidity. The time to operative decompression is a modifiable but inconsistently reported risk factor for TICH patients? We aimed to provide contemporary time to evacuation data and long-term trends in timing of TICH evacuation in a trauma system. A 13-year retrospective cohort study ending in 2021 at a trauma system with one level-1 trauma center included all patients undergoing urgent craniotomy or craniectomy for evacuation of TICH. Demographics, injury severity and key timeframes of care were collected. Subgroups analyzed were polytrauma versus isolated head injury, direct admissions versus transfers and those who survived versus those who died. Linear regression of times from injury to operating room was performed. Seventy-eight TICH patients (Age: 35 (22-56); 58 (74%) males; ISS: 25(25-41); AIS head: 5 (4-5); mortality: 21 (27%) patients) were identified. Initial GCS was 8 (3.25-14) which decreased to 3 (3-7) by arrival in the trauma center. There were 46 (59%) patients intubated prior to arrival. Median time from injury to operation was 4.88 (3.63-6.80) hours. Linear regression of injury to OR showed increasing times to operative intervention for direct admissions to the trauma center over the study period (p=0.04). There was no associated change in mortality or Glasgow outcome score over the same time. This contemporary data shows timing from injury to evacuation is approaching 5 hours. Over the 13-year study period the time to operative intervention significantly increased for direct admissions. This study will guide our institutions response to TICH presentations in the future. Other trauma systems should critically appraise their results with the same reporting standard.

Agent-based post-earthquake evacuation simulation to enhance early-stage architectural layout and non-structural design

In the indoor design process, architects make crucial decisions regarding architectural layout and the selection of non-structural elements. However, there is a lack of comprehensive consideration for human evacuation behavior, specifically in the event of earthquake evacuation, during the design process. This paper bridges this gap by presenting the application of Agent-Based Building Earthquake Evacuation Simulation (AB2E2S). The paper assesses a post-earthquake evacuation simulation prototype, which integrates an agent-based simulation technique with probabilistic earthquake damage assessment. The model is applied to the case of the engineering building at The University of Auckland, to evaluate the impact of earthquake intensity, design, and behavioral variables on Safe Evacuation Time and number of casualties. Overall, this paper demonstrates the potential of the AB2E2S prototype to inform architects and designers about the effective selection of non-structural elements and architectural layout scenarios for post-earthquake evacuation during the schematic design process.