EVACUATION DATA
The Key to Survival In the event of an emergency evacuation, time is a critical component of a successful outcome.
Before a corporate aircraft manufacturer can receive Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) certification, the manufacturer must prove that passengers can exit the aircraft quickly enough to comply with regulations. And over the years, the agency has upgraded cabin safety requirements making it more likely that passengers will survive an accident.
Aircraft have numerous required features, such as emergency lighting, fire-resistant seat cushions, low heat and smoke release cabin materials, and improved cabin insulation. These elements are designed to give passengers and crew adequate time to make a swift evacuation.
PASSING THE TEST
Certification requirements on emergency evacuations are intended to ensure that airplane design along with crew training provide a consistent level of safety across all the airplane models.
Regulations specify that the manufacturer of an airplane must show that the maximum number of crew and passengers can evacuate the airplane under simulated emergency conditions within a time specified in the regulations.
A full-scale demonstration is required unless the applicant can demonstrate to the satisfaction of the regulator that a combination of tests and analysis will yield equivalent data.
The regulations also spell out detailed conditions under which a full-scale evacuation demonstration must take place. They specify things such as the lighting conditions, configuration of the aircraft and the age and gender mix of passengers. One of the most important conditions is that the passengers must be “naive”, i.e., they may not have not participated in a similar type of demonstration for at least six months.
When the evacuation begins, the test passengers are directed to exit the plane just as they would in an actual emergency. The evacuation time period is up when the last person (passenger or crew member) has left the airplane and is on the ground.
RESEARCHING SURVIVAL
Since the 1960s, the FAA’s Civil Aerospace Medical Institute (CAMI) in Oklahoma City, OK, has been recognized as a world-renowned center for research on technical issues and human behavior associated with emergency aircraft evacuations.
CAMI’s Cabin Safety Research Team supports FAA regulatory and airworthiness functions through studies on seating density, exit size and location, passenger flow rates through exits and flight attendant behavior. The studies are done using an aircraft cabin evacuation facility and human research subjects.
15 Emergency Evacuations
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