FSEG high-rise construction site evacuation
FSEG director, Prof Ed Galea describes a unique research project to investigate how construction workers behave during evacuation. In total four full-scale unannounced evacuation trials and the five walking speed experiments were undertaken.
The data-set generated from these nine trials involving 1,072 participants and incorporates around 2,200 data points. The analysis of this data has produced a unique evidence base characterising, for the first time, the actual performance and behaviour of construction workers during emergency evacuation. The evidence base consists of, response times, worker walking speeds on different types of surfaces (concrete, decking, decking with rebar), and worker ascent and descent speeds on temporary dog-leg and parallel scaffold stairs and ladders.
The data have also been incorporated in the building evacuation simulation tool buildingEXODUS, providing it with a unique capability to simulate evacuation from high-rise construction sites. The new capabilities of the software have been validated using one of the experiemental data-sets and the software was then used to explore different options for improving evacuation performance of construction sites.
The project was supported by Multiplex, who provided access to two different high-rise construction sites in London and was funded by IOSH.
Check out the project on the FSEG web pages at: http://fseg.gre.ac.uk/fire/constructi...
Download the high-rise construction site evacaution validation data-set from the FSEG web pages at: http://fseg.gre.ac.uk/validation/buil...
Download the full report from the IOSH web pages at: https://www.iosh.com/constructionevac...