New Requirements to the Emergency Exits of Buses
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
NEW REQUIREMENTS TO THE EMERGENCY EXITS OF BUSES Dr. MATOLCSY, Mátyás Scientific Society of Mechanical Engineers Hungary Paper Number: 09-0181 ABSTACT general safety requirements of buses. The EE’s requirements are grouped as follows: Based on certain assumptions, the requirements of a) required number of EE-s emergency exits on buses and coaches are specified b) their location and distribution in ECE Regulation No.107. Different accident c) the required minimum dimensions situations, real accidents proved that some of the d) required access to EE-s original assumptions are not valid, so it is necessary e) technical requirements of their operation. to reformulate them. Accident statistics – contain- ing some hundreds bus accidents – and in depth These requirements are in force since 30 years and accident analysis were studied, concentrating on the during this period only a few, small corrections evacuation of buses and the rescue possibilities of were made to improve them for better understand- the bus occupants. Certain results and conclusions ing. But during this period a lot of experiences were of evacuation tests are also considered which show collected about the usability of different EE-s and the capabilities and limitations of different groups some very serious accidents – fire in the bus, many of passengers (men-women, young or elderly peo- injured passengers on board, panic among the pas- ple, etc.) when evacuating the bus through different sengers, etc. when the passengers could not evacu- kind of emergency exits. The new assumptions to ate the bus – called the attention to the problems of specify the required number and location of emer- the existing regulation. The need for improving the gency exits of buses are based on the following regulation has been raised in different working and perception: the usability of the individual emer- expert groups of the UN-ECE organization in Ge- gency exits are different in different bus categories neva. This paper tries to contribute to the discussion (e.g. low floor city bus, high-decker tourist coach, of this problem, concentrating on the subject groups etc.) or even in one category (lower or upper level “a” and “b” mentioned above. of a double-decker bus) and also in different acci- dent situations (e.g. frontal collision, rollover, fire, PRINCIPLES OF THE EXISTING RE- etc.) The next step is to specify the “usability” in QUIREMENTS technical, measurable terms. The paper proposes four aspects, shortly: to open the exit, to creep When working on the requirements of EE-s in the through the exit, to step/jump down from the bus bus regulation – 30 years ago – certain assumptions and the possibility of the continuous use of the exit. were used as starting points. (It has to be men- Some possible measures are proposed to these as- tioned: at that time the experts did not have too pects. On the basis of these aspects, all the emer- many information, experience on that field) Of gency exits may be qualified (good, acceptable, course these assumptions are not mentioned in the poor, not usable) in every bus categories and every regulation, but their consequences may be recog- accident situation. Finally the required number of nized: emergency exits (how many good, acceptable exit) could be specified which shall be provided for the • only that accident situation was considered occupants in every essential accident situation. when the bus is standing on its wheel. • the number of EE-s shall be proportional INTRODUCTION somehow to the passenger capacity of the bus • every separated compartment – passenger and In the case of an accident situation the passengers driver compartment – shall have EE. (This re- of a bus have to leave the vehicle as quickly as quirement has special importance in articulated possible. To do that they use every kind of exit and double deck buses) available for the evacuation. The following exits • the number of EE-s shall be closely the same were considered to serve as emergency exits (EE): on the two sides of the bus, as well as in the service door; emergency door; door of the driver’s front and rear half of the vehicle. cab; side window and rear window designated as • all kind of EE-s have the same usability, they emergency window; escape hatch and rear wall are equivalent to each other in all emergency door in case of small buses. The existing require- situations. ments for the bus EE-s are summarized in the UN- ECE Regulation 107, (R.107) among a lot of other Matolcsy 1 • a certain EE type (e.g. side window) has the same usability in all bus categories (e.g. mini- bus or the upper part of a double deck bus) • a certain EE type (e.g. escape hatch) has the same usability in every major accident situa- tions (e.g. the bus is standing on its wheel or on its roof) Figure 2. Local large-scale deformation of the bodywork ACCIDENT SITUATIONS TO BE CONSID- ERED When improving the requirements of EE-s, some of the original principles mentioned above should be reconsidered. One of the major issues is the list of the major accident situations to be considered, in which the EE-s can help, must help in the evacua- tion of the bus. These are: • rollover, considering the possible major situations after the accident (until one complete rotation), • front impact, considering the total or par- Figure 1. General collapse of the superstructure tial impacts, too, in rollover • side impacts, considering both sides and only heavy vehicles as impacting partner At the beginning it was not considered, but later it became evident that the EE-s can be used only if • rear impact, considering heavy vehicles the bodywork of the bus – at least in the surround- when impacting the full rear wall. ings of the EE – is not strongly damaged. The large • fire in the bus, considering different loca- scale structural deformations generally prevent to tions of fire initiation access, to operate and use the EE. Figure 1. gives • bus in shallow water (not completely sunk) examples about the total collapse of the superstruc- • combined accidents (the combination of ture in rollover accidents. These pictures prove that the above said accidents) in these cases it is meaningless to talk about EE-s. • special accidents. Figure 2. shows examples when only one, or just a Two of these accident situations need particular few EE-s can not be used because of strong, local attention. The rollover is the most complex acci- structural deformations. dent. More final bus positions may occur, but at least four basic situations shall be considered. The bus stops on its one side, or on the other one, may be on its roof or on its wheels. This last situation means that the rollover accident contains the basic evacuation situation, too, when the bus is just stand- ing on its wheels. The other important accident situation is the fire. The fire brings a very important, essential parame- ter into the evacuation process: the time limitation. The fire generates smoke, poisoning gases and heat which can block the passengers in the evacuation. It is interesting to mention that sometimes the fire is Matolcsy 2 the consequence of a rollover or a frontal collision (combined accident situation). In a rollover statis- tics containing 383 bus rollover accidents, 12 times the rollover was followed by a fire and the bus completely burned out. Among 256 frontal colli- sions it happened 14 times. These are very severe accidents with extremely high mortality and casu- alty rate. Figure 4. Increasing of temperature and poison- ing gas concentrations in the bus fire. THE USABILITY OF DIFFERENT EMER- GENCY EXITS Figure 3. Fire tests with complete bus type IK255 Fire tests were carried out in Hungary with three complete buses (type IK 255 and IK 415) simulat- ing five fire sources. Figure 3. shows one test when the whole fire propagation process was observed and studied with the measurement of temperature and some poisoning gas concentration increasing. [1] The source of fire was in the closed box of the heating device, under the floor. The measured val- ues (CO, HCl, HCN gas concentrations; tempera- tures Tfar far from the fire source and Tc close to that) are presented on Figure 4. Without detailed discussion of the test results it may be said that from the first possible observation of the fire, the available time for evacuation was in the range of 200-300 sec. The smoke density was not measured, but visually detected by filming it was developed Figure 5. Usability of side emergency window very rapidly. The critical values of gas concentra- tions are marked by a horizontal line on the left side The assumption that the usability of a certain type of the diagram. The life danger is mainly due to the of EE is the same in every bus categories is not gas and smoke concentration and less to the high true. Figure 5. shows the usability of the side emer- temperature. gency windows in case of double deck (DD) bus comparing the upper and lower level passenger Matolcsy 3 compartment (after a frontal collision) and also the by the fire brigade. It can be seen easily that the situation on a high (but single) deck (HD) tourist windscreen is one of the best, most usable EE in coach. The side emergency window is a very useful many accident situation, so in the future it should exit in the case of the lower level of a DD bus or on be considered. low floor buses, but they cannot be used in the case of the upper level of a DD bus or on a HD coach.