An improved social force model for pedestrian dynamics in shipwrecks

Evacuation in shipwrecks is still an open challenging problem and has not been incorporated by existing crowd simulation models. Motivated by this, we propose a simple but general model to characterize different scenarios of shipwrecks, based on the original social force model. Using a body-fitted coordinates, the psychological tendency of pedestrians to slip downhill has been incorporated to modeling evacuation behaviors on inclined decks of shipwrecks. Simulation results show that evacuation efficiency depends on the intricate relationship among the incline angle, the outlet direction as well as the desired velocity. It can be observed that when individuals try to move fast, evacuations against the downhill direction achieve maximum efficiency. In addition, we also consider the presence of “wicked pedestrians”, who might hurt others to gain advantage in evacuation. Intriguingly, the existence of only a few such offenders can decrease evacuation time, while continuously increasing their number is destined to inhibit evacuation efficiency. In conclusion, we give a framework focused on more complex evacuation dynamics, and hope for a better understanding of how to efficiently escape from such adverse environment.