An escape chute is a special kind of emergency exit, used where conventional fire escape stairways are impractical. The chute is a fabric (or occasionally metal) tube installed near a special exit on an upper floor or roof of a building, or a tall structure. During use, the chute is deployed, and may be secured at the bottom by a fire fighting crew some distance out from the building. Once the tube is ready, escapees enter the tube and slide down to a lower level or the ground level.
Although some early escape tubes were made entirely of metal, most current designs are made of high-strength fabrics, such as Kevlar. Their flexibility allows for compact storage, rapid deployment, and a gentler braking and controlled descent of users, as compared to traditional metal designs. Fabric tubes may also incorporate inflatable elements to lend some degree of structural rigidity and stability to the escape chute. The fabrics chosen must have flame retardant properties as well. [1]
In addition to fixed escape chutes permanently installed onto buildings, mobile escape systems are produced which can be mounted on the basket of a movable fire truck ladder, or temporarily installed to a building in an emergency. [2]
In response to images of trapped office workers in the September 11 attacks, personal escape devices for emergency use have been proposed, but only rope-based systems appear to be on the market for personal use. [3]
There was also the issue of fire heating the metal tubes, causing the people inside the metal tubes to become severely burned while exiting the building.
Escape chutes are also installed in air traffic control towers where space for redundant stairwells is limited. Escape chutes were tested at the control tower at Kadena Air Base.[ citation needed ]
There are two main Types of Escape chutes : Internal and External. [4]
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In 1948, the 136-bed Georgia Baptist Hospital in Atlanta featured a large fabric escape chute that was claimed to be able to empty the hospital "in only a few minutes". [5]
An escape chute system was installed at the Cape Canaveral launchpads for the now-discontinued NASA Space Shuttle, to allow personnel to rapidly reach a safety refuge blast shelter in the event of an imminent fire or explosion. The system was tested, but never deployed in actual use.[ citation needed ]
A parachute is a device used to slow the motion of an object through an atmosphere by creating drag or, in a ram-air parachute, aerodynamic lift. A major application is to support people, for recreation or as a safety device for aviators, who can exit from an aircraft at height and descend safely to earth.
A chute is a vertical or inclined plane, channel, or passage through which objects are moved by means of gravity.
The Iroquois Theatre fire occurred on December 30, 1903 at the Iroquois Theatre in Chicago. It is one of the deadliest single-building fires in American history, resulting in 602 deaths.
A standpipe or riser is a type of rigid water piping which is built into multi-story buildings in a vertical position, or into bridges in a horizontal position, to which fire hoses can be connected, allowing manual application of water to the fire. Within the context of a building or bridge, a standpipe serves the same purpose as a fire hydrant.
A drogue parachute is a parachute designed for deployment from a rapidly moving object. It can be used for various purposes, such as to decrease speed, to provide control and stability, or as a pilot parachute to deploy a larger parachute. Vehicles that have used drogue parachutes include multistage parachutes, aircraft, and spacecraft recovery systems.
A crash bar is a type of door opening mechanism which allows users to open a door by pushing a bar. While originally conceived as a way to prevent crowd crushing in an emergency, crash bars are now used as the primary door opening mechanism in many commercial buildings.
An emergency exit in a structure is a special exit for emergencies such as a fire or other emergencies; the combined use of regular and special exits allows for faster evacuation, while it also provides an alternative if the route to the regular exit is blocked.
An emergency light is a battery-backed lighting device that switches on automatically when a building experiences a power outage.
Emergency evacuation is the urgent immediate egress or escape of people away from an area that contains an imminent threat, an ongoing threat or a hazard to lives or property.
A fire escape is a special kind of emergency exit, usually mounted to the outside of a building or occasionally inside but separate from the main areas of the building. It provides a method of escape in the event of a fire or other emergency that makes the stairwells inside a building inaccessible. Fire escapes are most often found on multiple-story residential buildings, such as apartment buildings.
A fire alarm system is a building system designed to detect and alert occupants and emergency forces of the presence of smoke, fire, carbon monoxide, or other fire-related emergencies. Fire alarm systems are required in most commercial buildings. They may include smoke detectors, heat detectors, and manual fire alarm activation devices, all of which are connected to a Fire Alarm Control Panel (FACP) normally found in an electrical room or panel room. Fire alarm systems generally use visual and audio signalization to warn the occupants of the building. Some fire alarm systems may also disable elevators, which under most circumstances, are unsafe to use during a fire.
The Kader Toy Factory fire occurred on 10 May 1993 at a factory in Thailand. It is considered the worst industrial factory fire in history, killing 188 persons, and injuring 469. Most of the victims were young female workers from rural families.
Edifício Praça da Bandeira, formerly known as the Joelma Building, is a 25-story building in downtown São Paulo, Brazil, completed in 1971, located at Avenida 9 de Julho, 225. On 1 February 1974, an air conditioning unit on the twelfth floor overheated, starting a fire. Because flammable materials had been used to furnish the interior, the entire building was engulfed in flames within twenty minutes. Of the 756 people occupying the building at the time, 179 were killed and 300 injured.
Ducts are conduits or passages used in heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) to deliver and remove air. The needed airflows include, for example, supply air, return air, and exhaust air. Ducts commonly also deliver ventilation air as part of the supply air. As such, air ducts are one method of ensuring acceptable indoor air quality as well as thermal comfort.
An evacuation slide is an inflatable slide used to evacuate an aircraft quickly. An escape slide is required on all commercial aircraft where the door sill height is such that, in the event of an evacuation, passengers would be unable to step down from the door uninjured.
A marine evacuation system (MES) is a lifesaving device found on many modern passenger ships or oil rigs consisting of an inflatable slide or escape chute where a passenger can evacuate straight into waiting life rafts. Developed in 1979 by RFD, a New Zealand–based company that distributes safety equipment; MES is replacing traditional davit-launched life rafts used on ships.
The Brown Building is a ten-story building that is part of the campus of New York University (NYU), which owns it. It is located at 23–29 Washington Place, between Greene Street and Washington Square East in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City, and is best known as the location of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire of March 25 1911, which killed 146 people.
The Sennichi Department Store Building fire occurred in Sennichimae, Minami-ku, Osaka, Japan on May 13, 1972. The fire killed at least 118 people and injured another 78. It was the worst department store fire in terms of casualties in Japan. The building that housed the department store also contained various other businesses, including a cabaret. All of the victims had been in the cabaret.
An exit sign is a pictogram or short text in a public facility denoting the location of the closest emergency exit to be used in case of fire or other emergency that requires rapid evacuation. Most relevant codes require exit signs to be permanently lit at all times.
ISO 7010 is an International Organization for Standardization technical standard for graphical hazard symbols on hazard and safety signs, including those indicating emergency exits. It uses colours and principles set out in ISO 3864 for these symbols, and is intended to provide "safety information that relies as little as possible on the use of words to achieve understanding."