INJURY RISK ASSESSMENT OF ACCIDENT OF FALLING TO WATER BY USING A COUPLED HUMAN-FLOW SIMULATION MODEL

Abstract

 Injury risk of accident of falling to water is assessed by using a coupled human-flow simulation. In assuming 10m of falling height, a series of simulations were conducted with different combination of water depth and initial body posture. By applying injury index of automobile accident, concrete injury type and survival rate were evaluated from forces affected both from fluid and collision to bed surface. While both of standing posture and inverted posture show relatively smaller risk for entering to water surface, colliding to bed surface result in high injury risk in the case of shallow water. Especially, colliding with inverted posture result in crucial injury. Furthermore, falling with a prone posture causes lung rupture due to impact to water surface. Therefore, it was found that both of water depth and posture have a large influence on injuries and survivalbility.