Other people's support is essential for vulnerable people to evacuate as fast as possible when attacked by Tsunami. Therefore, it is important to consider transport routes and transport methods in Tsunami evacuation tower.
The purpose of this study is to compare and analyze the transport velocity evacuation supporters carried a vulnerable person to evacuate from Tsunami in Tsunami evacuation tower. For that, we carried out a transport experiment at 1st Tsunami evacuation tower in Kochi Prefecture. We used 5 transport methods (wheelchair, transport chair, rollator, simple stretcher and shoulder) and 3 transport routes (straight line slope, spiral slope and stairs) in this transport experiment.
As a result, regarding transport method, the average velocity is fast in the order of wheelchair, transport chair and rollator in straight line slope and spiral slope. In stairs, average velocity is fast in the order of shoulder, simple stretcher and wheelchair. However, more than half of female subject discontinued this transport experiment by shoulder. Considering the safety of evacuation supporters, simple stretcher is the best transport methods in stairs. As for transport route, spiral slope is the best transport route of all routes.
According to questionnaire, regarding transport methods, physical burden index is high in the order of wheelchair, transport chair and rollator in straight line slope and spiral slope. In stairs, physical burden index is high in the order of simple stretcher, wheelchair and shoulder. As for transport route, it found that physical burden index is high in the order of spiral slope, straight line slope and stairs.
Taking every factor into consideration, transporting vulnerable people by using wheelchair in spiral slope is the best way to evacuate in Tsunami evacuation tower.
In addition, this study derived the transport time formula based on the experiment result and previous studies. And we calculated transport time in various cases by this formula. Consequently, it was found that evacuation can be done smoothly by using only spiral slope or stairs and spiral slope. But, in case of disaster, there is a risk of being crowd with many evacuees due to the narrowness of transport route width and the slow transport velocity. For these reasons, accurate evacuation guidance is very important to evacuate smoothly when disaster occurs.
Finally it was found that evacuation can be done smoothly by properly guiding the evacuation supporters and their vulnerable person to evacuate on spiral slope by using wheelchair and a healthy person to evacuate on stairs. For that, it is necessary to study how to introduce accurate evacuation guidance.
In order to effectively establish the Tsunami evacuation tower plan for vulnerable people in case of disaster, it is required to review factors influencing transport velocity and evacuation routes.
