Integrating fire, structure and agent models

Abstract

A state-of-the-art integrated environment was created to study interaction among fire, structure and agent models in a fire evacuation from a typical office building. For the fire simulations MIST large-eddy simulation code Fire Dynamics Simulator (FDS) was used. The code is based on a mixture fraction model. FDS provided time resolved temperature, CO, CO2, soot distribution in the building. The agent software was designed to simulate agent behaviors during evacuation by tracking the behavior of each individual in the building taking into account effects of temperature, CO, and soot on the behavior and health for each agent. The created integrated environment was designed to provide the bridge between multiple simulations for data transfer and model interaction. It was shown that fire position, agent positions, and number of exits available affect significantly agents' health and death toll. The results can be used for better fire safety building design and regulations. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2005.