Influence of committed volunteers on helping behavior in emergency evacuations

We study how the presence of committed volunteers influences the collective helping behavior in emergency evacuation scenarios. In this study, committed volunteers do not change their decision to help injured persons, implying that other evacuees may adapt their helping behavior through strategic interactions. An evolutionary game theoretic model is developed which is then coupled to a pedestrian movement model to examine the collective helping behavior in evacuations. By systematically controlling the number of committed volunteers and payoff parameters, we have characterized and summarized various collective helping behaviors in phase diagrams. From our numerical simulations, we observe that the existence of committed volunteers can promote cooperation but adding additional committed volunteers is effective only above a minimum number of committed volunteers. This study also highlights that the evolution of collective helping behavior is strongly affected by the evacuation process.

Flood Assessment and Identification of Emergency Evacuation Routes in Seti River Basin, Nepal

Sudden floods frequently occur in the Himalayas under changing climates. Rapid glacial melt has resulted in the formation of glacial lakes and associated hazards. This research aimed to (1) identify flood-prone houses, (2) determine pedestrian emergency evacuation routes, and (3) analyze their relationships to socioeconomic status in the Seti River Basin. Detailed hazard maps were created using field survey results from unmanned aerial vehicle photogrammetry and the Hydrologic Engineering Center River Analysis System. Questionnaire, focus-group, and key-informant surveys helped identify the socioeconomic situation. Inundation maps revealed that most residents are exposed to future flooding hazards without proper evacuation routes. Highly impoverished and immigrant households were at the highest risk in terms of income inequality and migration rate (p < 0.001) and were located on the riverside. The locations of 455 laborers’ houses were significantly correlated with inundation hazards (p < 0.001). Governmental and associated agencies must develop adequate plans to relocate low-income households. Group discussions revealed the need for stronger adaptive capacity-building strategies for future risk management. Pokhara requires better systematic and scientific land-use planning strategies to address this issue efficiently. A similar approach that combines flood modeling, proper evacuation route access, and socioeconomic survey is suggested for this river basin.

IMMERSIVE AUGMENTED REALITY SYSTEM TO STUDY THE EFFICIENCY OF DYNAMIC EXIT SIGNAGE

Every year, many disasters occur to buildings causing their destruction and leading to huge casualties. One way of preventing casualties is by evacuation drill activity. Although accurate evacuation drills could enhance the efficiency of the process during the real event, these drills are not fully effective because participants miss the sense of being stressed or under pressure while in action. Several gaming concepts have been introduced to train the participants on how to cope with and evacuate effectively during an emergency. For instance, Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR) interfaces could provide virtual content to enhance the effectiveness of evacuation drills. However, accurate representation of different evacuation scenarios and its impact analysis during emergency using the above technologies are still debatable, mainly due to immersion quality. Thus, this study proposes an Immersive Augmented Reality (IAR) application that is mainly the amalgamation of AR and VR in realizing fast and safe evacuation during on-site building emergencies. A virtual dynamic exit signage system is also developed in the proposed “Smart Evacuation application“. This work evaluated the efficiency of a virtual dynamic exit signage and also a proposed “Smart Evacuation“ system by analysing on-site emergency evacuation processes. By setting up various scenarios imitating real life disasters, this research analysed the time taken and level of stress of the occupants during the evacuation of a chosen site. The proposed “Smart Evacution“ achieved 33.82% better perfomance compared to normal evacuation thus indicating a faster and safer evacuation. ABSTRAK: Secara statistik, kebanyakan bencana kemusnahan bangunan yang berlaku setiap tahun telah menyebabkan kerugian besar. Salah satu cara bagi mengelak kejadian ini adalah melalui aktiviti latih tubi evakuasi. Walaupun latih tubi evakuasi ini dapat menambah proses kecekapan semasa kejadian sebenar, latih tubi ini tidak benar-benar berkesan kerana peserta kurang mendalami perasaan tertekan atau di bawah tekanan semasa kejadian. Pelbagai konsep permainan telah diperkenalkan bagi melatih peserta bagaimana perlu bertindak dan evakuasi secara efektif semasa kecemasan. Sebagai contoh, antarmuka Realiti Terimbuh (AR) dan Realiti Maya (VR) mungkin dapat menghasilkan simulasi secara maya bagi menambah keberkesanan latih tubi evakuasi. Walau bagaimanapun, ketepatan representasi pelbagai senario evakuasi dan analisis tekanan semasa kecemasan menggunakan teknik-teknik di atas adalah masih boleh dipertikaikan terutama kerana kualiti kedalamannya. Oleh itu, kajian ini mencadangkan aplikasi Realiti Terimbuh Mendalam (IAR) di mana tumpuan adalah pada kombinasi AR dan VR dibuat dengan secara evakuasi pantas dan selamat semasa kecemasan pada bangunan kejadian. Sistem maya penunjuk arah keluar dinamik turut dicipta dalam “Aplikasi Evakuasi Pintar” yang dicadangkan ini. Kajian ini menilai keberkesanan sistem maya penunjuk arah keluar secara dinamik dan juga sistem “Evakuasi Pintar” dengan menganalisa proses evakuasi kecemasan pada tempat kejadian. Dengan mengadakan pelbagai jenis senario dan meniru bencana sebenar, kajian ini menganalisa masa yang diambil dan tahap tekanan penghuni bangunan semasa proses evakuasi berlaku pada tapak pilihan. “Evakuasi Pintar” ini mencapai 33.82% keberkesanan pada prestasi berbanding evakuasi biasa. Ia membuktikan proses evakuasi ini lebih pantas dan selamat.

Towards Modelling of Evacuation Behavior and Planning for Emergency Logistics Due to the Philippine Taal Volcanic Eruption in 2020

Emergency evacuation is the immediate escape of people away from a place of an imminent threat to a place of safety. The ability of the households to evacuate is a crucial component in reducing disaster risk. Logistical issues such as a lack of resources during and after the evacuation, as well as road congestion, might arise, especially in short and no-notice calamities such as a volcanic eruption. This study examines the relationship of variables of evacuation logistics of Barangay Banga, Talisay, Batangas in the context of the 2020 Taal Volcanic eruption. A survey was conducted based on the experience of the households during the volcanic eruption. A descriptive statistical analysis was performed for all the variables on household evacuation logistics to understand the behavior of households as they make decisions during emergencies. These variables include the type of evacuation, departure timing, evacuation mode choice, and destination choice. Additionally, a pairwise correlation was employed to identify the influential factors related to household evacuation logistics such as socio-demographic and household characteristics, hazard-related factors as well as their experience with Taal Volcano’s recurring activities. The results of this study aim to provide insights to a better understanding of the evacuation behavior of households in the context of a volcanic eruption and be useful in the evacuation logistics planning of the country.

An improved ant colony algorithm based on artificial potential field and quantum evolution theory

The optimal evacuation route in emergency evacuation can further reduce casualties. Therefore, path planning is of great significance to emergency evacuation. Aiming at the blindness and relatively slow convergence speed of ant colony algorithm path planning search, an improved ant colony algorithm is proposed by combining artificial potential field and quantum evolution theory. On the one hand, the evacuation environment of pedestrians is modeled by the grid method. Use the potential field force in the artificial potential field, the influence coefficient of the potential field force heuristic information, and the distance between the person and the target position in the ant colony algorithm to construct comprehensive heuristic information. On the other hand, the introduction of quantum evolutionary theory. The pheromone is represented by quantum bits, and the pheromone is updated by quantum revolving door feedback control. In this way, it can not only reflect the high efficiency of quantum parallel computing, but also have the better optimization ability of ant colony algorithm. A large number of simulation experiments show that the improved ant colony algorithm has a faster convergence rate and is more effective in evacuation path planning.

An Extension of the Exit Choice Model: Considering the Variance in the Perspectives of Evacuees When Interacting with the Spread of Fire

Understanding evacuees’ responses to dynamic environmental changes, during an emergency evacuation, is of great importance in determining which aspects are ideal and which aspects should be eliminated or corrected. Evacuees differ in their ability to continually plan escape routes and adapt the routes chosen when they become unsafe owing to moving sources of threat. This is because they have different views and perspectives. The perspectives of evacuees are stochastic and are characterized by a high degree of uncertainty and complexity. To reduce the complexity and control of uncertainty, a model is proposed that can test for variant stochastic representations of evacuees’ perspectives. Two extremely realistic perspectives—the most ideal and the least ideal—are proposed to reasonably limit the range of variance. The success of achieving optimal evacuation is tested when different tendencies towards extreme perspectives are adopted. It is concluded that data toward the most ideal perspectives are capable of demonstrating safer evacuation by reducing the number of simulated burnt agents. This study enables crowd managers and fire safety researchers to test guidance systems as well as configuration of buildings using different perspectives of evacuees.

INTEGRATION OF BUILDING INFORMATION MODELING AND AGENT-BASED MODELING FOR EVACUATION SIMULATION

Building Information Modelling (BIM) is a highly advanced spatial modeling method that is fully incorporated in the building lifecycle. With the support of Information Technologies, the use of BIM has become common in building management such as energy efficiency, indoor navigation and emergency evacuation simulations. This study focuses on emergency evacuation simulations since, integrating BIM and Spatial Information Science, could mitigate casualties in emergencies. Traditional evacuation management methods are generally inadequate since they are based on 2D evacuation plans, they are static and do not consider the characteristics/interactions of the people in the building. This study aims to integrate BIM and Agent-Based Modelling (ABM) for emergency evacuation simulations, where characteristics of the building and the users are incorporated. Istanbul Technical University Faculty of Civil Engineering was selected as study area and the BIM model was created by using the CAD drawings of the floor plans. The users of the Faculty building such as students, academicians, administrative staff and visitors are considered for simulations. The BIM model was transferred to the ABM environment, and the routes used during the fire evacuation were generated. Fire evacuation simulations were performed, where agents having different characteristics evacuate the building according to the rules predefined. Three different scenarios were tested. Major conclusion of this study is that, via integrating BIM and ABM, it is possible to model people’s behavior within a three-dimensional digital environment, where decision-makers could be performing simulations such as fire evacuation supported by dynamic, realistic and accurate information.

Application of Extended Lattice Gas Automata Model in Ship Evacuation Simulation

Lattice gas automaton is a mathematical model that is used to simulate the horizontal uniform evacuation behaviour of a group. However, extended lattice gas automata model is proposed to examine marine evacuation behaviour, which is subject to deck heeling. The application of distance accumulation algorithm and the conversion probability mostly make the extended model, while the approach deals with the most complicated ship evacuation. Moreover, the suggested model is expected to enhance the safety and efficiency of evacuation. The distance accumulation lattice gas automata model considers multiple movement behaviours, flow density, deck heeling, counterflow, and congestion. Movement behaviour will be severely affected in deck heeling process where people may walk normally, walk while bent over, or crawl. To verify the proposed model, 11 test scenarios and several emergency evacuation scenarios are demonstrated. The simulation results explain the validity of another experimental model. The number of people in counterflow, deck heeling, and difference in movement have a direct effect on evacuation, which is as discussed in results. This research article provides a brief study on ship design and crew response behaviour in case of mishap/accident.

Passenger management strategy and evacuation in subway station under Covid-19

Under the background of Covid-19 sweeping the world, safe and reasonable passenger flow management strategy in subway stations is an effective means to prevent the spread of virus. Based on the social force model and the minimum cost model, the movement and path selection behavior of passengers in the subway station are modeled, and a strategy for passenger flow management to maintain a safe social distance is put forward. Take Qingdao Jinggangshan Road subway station of China as the simulation scene, the validity of the simulation model is verified by comparing the measured value and simulation value of the time required for passengers from getting off the train to the ticket gate. Simulation results indicate that controlling the time interval between incoming passengers at the entrance can effectively control the social distance between passengers and reduce the risk of epidemic infection. By comparing the evacuation process of passengers under different initial densities, it is found that the greater the initial density of passengers, the longer the passengers are at risk social distance. In the process of passenger emergency evacuation, the stairs/escalators and ticket gates are bottleneck areas with high concentration of passenger density, which should be strictly disinfected many times on the basis of strictly checking the health code of incoming passengers and controlling the arrival time interval. The simulation results of this paper verify the harmfulness of passenger emergency evacuation without protective measures, and provide theoretical support for the operation and management of subway station under the epidemic situation.

A SIMULATION-BASED METHODOLOGY FOR EVALUATING THE FACTORS ON SHIP EMERGENCY EVACUATION

There are many hazards on a ship that makes an emergency evacuation process inevitable. Providing safe and effective evacuation of passengers from ships in an emergency situation becomes critical. Handling a real ship evacuation practice is often unaffordable as modelling such an environment is very expensive and may cause severe distress to participants. As an alternative, simulation models have been used to overwhelm the issue above in recent years. Therefore, this paper proposes a novel simulation-based methodology for evaluating the effect of factors including physical as well as psychological passenger characteristics and routeing systematic on emergency evacuation process for public marine transportation. A detailed questionnaire has been conducted in this work to reflect passenger characteristics on simulation model in a more realistic manner. Also, a new routeing systematic is developed to provide an efficient evacuation procedure. As another contribution, a novel grid-based approach where the meshed discretized nodes can contain more than one passenger is proposed in simulation model for the first time. Then, a statistical analysis is included within the methodology to assess the importance level of each factor on evacuation time. The proposed methodology is applied to a real life Ro-Ro ferry. A validation protocol based on IMO regulations is conducted and confirmed the effectiveness of the suggested simulation model. The simulation of different scenario types have indicated the influencing factors in a ship emergency evacuation. According to results, passenger characteristics has been identified as the most dominant factor on evacuation performance. The highest evacuation time difference has been observed for different levels of weight attribute. Moreover, it is concluded that the consideration of load utilization balancing among evacuation systems for routeing decreases evacuation time significantly. Finally, significant evacuation time difference between grid approaches have been demonstrated.