A novel evacuation route search algorithm for route distribution of evacuees groups in fire disasters

A lot of people have suffered and died due to sudden disasters (fire, earthquake, terrorism, etc) in the world. In sudden disasters, it is very important for evacuees to find out appropriate evacuation routes. We previously proposed the evacuation support system named as Emergency Rescue Evacuation Support System (ERESS). This system is based on MANET and aims to dramatically reduce the number of victims in sudden disasters. This paper deals with the evacuation route search which is one of the most important functions of ERESS. In this paper, we propose a new evacuation route search algorithm for route distribution of evacuees groups in fire disasters. In this algorithm, evacuees can evacuate more safely and immediately by avoiding the congestion passage. To show the validity of the proposed algorithm, we carry out performance evaluations by computer simulations. As the results, we show that more evacuees can evacuate effectively compared with the previous route search algorithm.