Analysis of Evacuation Strategies for Design and Certification of Transport Airplanes

Abstract

A method developed to assess the ine uence of the cabin arrangement in the emergency evacuation of transport airplanes is described. The method has been conceived for design and certie cation purposes and is not intended to reproduceaircraftaccidents.Theprocedureisbasedonaseat-to-exitassignmentalgorithmand asetofoperational restrictions and is aimed at minimizing the total distance traveled by all passengers along the escaping path and obtaining the most adequate sharing among the exits. Threerestrictions areconsidered: limitation in exit capacity, obligation to egress through the nearest exit, and limitation in the distance covered by each passenger. More than 30 cabins, belonging to turboprops, narrow-body, and wide-body jets, have been analyzed. Seat-to-exit distance of all passengers and number of evacuees per exit are the main output variables. A procedure to estimate differences inevacuation timeamong diverse conditions of thesame cabin, orbetween cabins of similarairplanes, is described. Theresultsshowtheine uenceoflefttorightasymmetriesandinappropriatematchingbetweensizeandlongitudinal location of exits.