“FlowTech” and “EvaTech”: Two Computer-Simulation Methods for Evacuation Calculation

Summary FlowTech and EvaTech are software tools for evacuation simulation, representing two different approaches: macroscopic and microscopic. FlowTech was developed due to the need that arose in Russia in a software tool for evacuation calculation which would correspond to methods and correlations enlisted in the present Russian State Standard of evacuation calculation “GOST 12.1.004-91*. Fire Safety. General Requirements” (IPK Standards, Moscow, 1996), based on the work of V.M. Predtechenskii and A.I. Milinskii (“Planning for Foot Traffic Flow in Buildings” (Amerind, New Delhi, 1978). FlowTech supports now different “hand-calculation” methods of evacuation calculation such as “GOST 12.1.004-91*”, the Moscow city standard “Moscow City Construction Regulations” (MGSN 4.19-2005, Moscow Government, Moscow, 2005) and the method recommended by the Society of Fire Protection Engineers (SFPE) (Nelson and Mowrer in The SFPE Handbook of Fire Protection Engineering, SFPE, Bethesda, MD, 2002). FlowTech approaches modeling of flow movement as a representation of evacuation process which consists of formation, movement and merging of flows. Since separate persons are not singled out from the flow, this approach is called a macroscopic approach. In spite of its simplicity it allows to predict evacuation times and congestion points in buildings quite accurately and can be widely used as a fast means of evacuation calculation with little effort of a building model construction. For cases when a representation of individuals is needed (e.g. in case of evacuation from a room with a complex planning, or when human behavior is an important factor which will affect the simulation) the software tool EvaTech is under development.