Fire Safety Science Digital Archive

A practical calculation method for the vestibule pressurization smoke control systems was provided in previous papers [1][2]. This method covers fire scenarios corresponding to every stage of building evacuation in fire, namely, fire room evacuation, fire floor evacuation and whole building evacuation, and consists of a series of equations which can be successively calculated by a hand calculator to obtain required air supply rates to vestibules and elevator shafts. The required air supply rates may be calculated under the condition that all the doors are open in order to cope with the worst scenario. However, such an opening condition of the doors may not be the worst for the required air supply rates, since the pressures of the corridors and the elevator shafts are affected by the opening conditions in a complex manner. In this study, the effects of opening conditions of fire room doors on the corridor pressure and the required air supply rates at the stage of whole building evacuation are examined. In addition, the influence of closure of staircase doors on the required air supply rates is investigated.