Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Individual Stair Ascent and Descent Walk Speeds Measured in a Korean High-Rise Building

  • Published:
Fire Technology Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to collect and analyze individual unimpeded stair ascent and descent walk speeds for the Korean population. To collect these data, a full-scale experiment was conducted in a 50-storey residential building in Korea involving 30 male and 30 female participants with an average age of 23.4 years. Each participant was required to ascend 50 floors and after a suitable rest period was then required to descend 50 floors using the stairs. Arrival times on each floor were recorded using video cameras, allowing floor by floor walk speeds to be determined and to assess whether fatigue affected the descent/ascent. The average descent speed for the male and female population was 0.83 m/s and 0.74 m/s, respectively, while the average ascent speed was 0.66 m/s and 0.48 m/s. However, there was no significant relationship between body mass index and stair walk speed or unimpeded horizontal walk speed and stair walk speed. During the descent, 50% of the population displayed a decrease in the walk speed over the final half of the descent with a maximum decrease of some 19%. However, some 50% of the population increased their travel speed during the final half of the descent. During the ascent, all participants decreased their speed over the first 20 floors by an average of approximately 60%. Implications of these findings for evacuation modeling/simulation are discussed.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Figure 1
Figure 2
Figure 3
Figure 4
Figure 5
Figure 6
Figure 7
Figure 8
Figure 9
Figure 10

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. Fruin JJ (1971) Pedestrian planning design. Metropolitan Association of Urban Designers and Environmental Planners, New York

    Google Scholar 

  2. Predtechenskii VM, Milinskii AI (1978) Planning for foot traffic flow in buildings. Amerind, New Delhi

    Google Scholar 

  3. Pauls JL, Jones BK (1980) Building evacuation: research methods and case studies. In: Cantor D (ed) Fires and human behaviour. Wiley, New York, pp 227–249

    Google Scholar 

  4. Pauls J (1995) Movement of people. In: DiNenno P (ed) SFPE handbook of fire protection engineering, 2nd edn. National Fire Protection Association, Quincy, pp 3-263–3-285

  5. Proulx G (2007) High-rise office egress: the human factors. In: Architectural engineering institute of the American society of civil engineers symposium on high-rise building egress, New York, 15 May 2007, pp 1–5. Architectural Engineering Institute (AEI) of American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), New York

  6. Pauls J (2008) Performance of means of egress conducting the research needed to establish realistic expectations. In: Proceedings of SFPE 7th international conference on performance based codes and fire safety design methods, Auckland, New Zealand, 16–18 April 2008, pp 217–228. SFPE, Massachusetts

  7. Pauls J (2007) Design issues within the egress stairway enclosure. In: Proceedings of AEI symposium on egress stairs in high-rise buildings. Architectural Engineering Institute of the American Society of Civil Engineers, New York

  8. Spearpoint M, MacLennan HA (2012) The effect of an ageing and less fit population on the ability of people to egress buildings. Saf Sci 50:675–1684

    Article  Google Scholar 

  9. Waterson NP, Mecca A, Wall JM (2004) Evacuation of a multilevel office building: comparison of predicted results using an agent-based model with measured data. In: Interflam 2004: 10th international fire science and engineering conference, Edinburgh, UK, 5–7 July 2004, pp 767–772. Interscience Communications Ltd, London

  10. Galea ER, Sharp G, Lawrence PJ et al (2008) Approximating the evacuation of the World Trade Center North Tower using computer simulation. J Fire Prot Eng 18:85–115

    Article  Google Scholar 

  11. Galea ER, Gwynne S, Lawrence PJ et al (2011) BuildingEXODUS V5.0 user guide and technical manual. Fire Safety Engineering Group, University of Greenwich, London

  12. Pauls J (2008) Private communication with Galea ER, 17 February 2008

  13. Proulx G (2002) Movement of people: the evacuation timing. In: The SFPE handbook of fire protection engineering, 3rd edn, Chap. 3–13. Society of Fire Protection Engineers, Bethesda, pp 3-341–3-366

  14. Kretz T, Grünebohma A, Kessel A et al (2008) Upstairs walk speed distributions on a long stairway. Saf Sci 46:72–78

    Article  Google Scholar 

  15. Galea ER, Blake SJ (2004) Collection and analysis of data relating to the evacuation of the World Trade Centre buildings on 11 September 2001. Report produced for the UK ODPM. Fire Research Technical Report 6/2005, December 2004. ODPM, London

  16. Averill JD, Mileti DS, Peacock RD et al (2005) Federal building and fire safety investigation of the WTC disaster, occupant behaviour, egress and emergency communications. Final report on the collapse of the world trade center towers. NIST NCSTAR, 1–7 September 2005. NIST, Gaithersburg

  17. Galea ER, Hulse L, Day R et al (2012) The UK WTC 9/11 evacuation study: an overview of findings derived from first-hand interview data and computer modeling. Fire Mater 36:501–521

    Article  Google Scholar 

  18. Hostikka S, Paloposki T, Rine T et al (2007) Evacuation experiments in offices and public buildings. VTT working papers 85. VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland, Espoo

  19. Fujiyama T, Tyler N (2004) An explicit study on walk speeds of pedestrians on stairs. In: 10th international conference on mobility and transport for elderly and disabled people, Mamamatsu, Japan, 23–26 May 2004, pp 643–652, Japan Society of Civil Engineers & Transportation Research Board, USA

  20. Peacock RD, Hoskins BL, Kuligowski ED (2012) Overall and local movement speeds during fire drill evacuations in buildings up to 31 stories. Saf Sci 50:1655–1664

    Article  Google Scholar 

  21. Yeo SK, He Y (2008) Commuter characteristics in mass rapid transit in Singapore. Fire Saf J 44:183–191

    Article  Google Scholar 

  22. Fang ZM, Song WG, Li ZJ et al (2012) Experimental study on evacuation process in a stairwell of a high-rise building. Build Environ 47:316–321

    Article  Google Scholar 

  23. Ma J, Song WJ, Tian W et al (2012) Experimental study on an ultra high-rise building evacuation in China. Saf Sci 50:1665–1674

    Article  Google Scholar 

  24. Jung HC, Seok YK, Lee JP (2003) The effect of icing recovery-method on HR, rlasma lactate concentration and exercise performance after 400 m running. Korean Soc Sports Sci 12:539–546 (written in Korean language)

    Google Scholar 

  25. Galea ER, Deere SJ, Filippidis L et al (2012) The SAFEGUARD validation data-set and recommendations to IMO to update MSC Circ 1238. In: Proceedings of the SAFEGUARD passenger evacuation seminar, London, UK, 30 November 2012, pp 41–60. The Royal Institution of Naval Architects, London

Download references

Acknowledgments

This work was supported by a grant from Human-Induced Disaster Prevention Technology Development Program funded by the National Emergency Management Agency of Korea (2012-NEMA05-014-01030000-2012). This work was also supported by National Research Foundation of Korea Grant funded by the Korean Government, Ministry of Education, Science and Technology (NRF-2011-357-D00261) which enabled Choi to work with Galea.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Fire Protection Engineering, Pukyong National University, Pusan, South Korea

    Jun-Ho Choi

  2. Fire Safety Engineering Group, University of Greenwich, Park Row, London, SE10 9LS, UK

    Jun-Ho Choi & Edwin Richard Galea

  3. School of Architecture and Civil Engineering, Kyungpook National University, Taegu, South Korea

    Won-Hwa Hong

Authors
  1. Jun-Ho Choi
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Edwin Richard Galea
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Won-Hwa Hong
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Edwin Richard Galea.

Additional information

Originally published online only in Journal of Fire Protection Engineering, published by SAGE (http://jfe.sagepub.com/content/early/recent).

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Choi, JH., Galea, E.R. & Hong, WH. Individual Stair Ascent and Descent Walk Speeds Measured in a Korean High-Rise Building. Fire Technol 50, 267–295 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10694-013-0371-4

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10694-013-0371-4

Keywords

Search

Navigation