| Title |
A Study on the Physically Disabled Persons′ Utilization of Underground Living Spaces and Evacuation Experiment |
| Authors |
Lee Ho-Young ; Na Wook-Jung ; Hong Won-Hwa |
| Keywords |
Underground Living Space ; The Physically Disabled ; Evacuation Experiment ; Convenient Facilities ; Fire Safety |
| Abstract |
Due to the lack of spaces, underground living spaces such as underground shopping and subway have been developed and many people spend their time underground. Since the Daegu subway fire, awareness about fire response and evacuation in the underground living space is increasing. That is why there has been lots of political alternatives and technical studies of fire evacuation. The underground living spaces are used by many and unspecified people so that it can have lots of risks. For the evacuation safety, people are to secure the root to evacuate to refuge. The current regulation of the egress doesn't include how to deal with the facilities and evacuation system for the disabled. In this paper, the current status of facilities for the disabled is researched and an evacuation experiment is conducted. Some participants performed as assistants to help the disabled to evacuate in the experiment. Many physically disabled people go to underground living spaces, and electronic wheelchairs are used to assist them. The elevators are facilities that help physically disabled people, seniors and pregnant women move easily to another spaces in underground living spaces. According to the studies on evacuation test accompanied with assistance, it is the fastest way to assist disabled people with only one assistant. In addition, there was no difference on horizontal movement, but for vertical movement, it shows big difference on speed. When evacuating, assistants must help physically disabled people by respecting their opinions. In case of evacuation by two or three assistants, they need to reach mutual agreement on how they lift up wheelchairs and evacuate safely. |