Flow Pattern and Escape Hazards of People from Flood Intrusion into the Staircase of Underground Spaces with Multiple Rest Platforms

While urban underground space is being built and developed at a high speed, urban flooding is also occurring gradually and frequently. Urban water, in many disasters, has intruded into underground spaces, such as subway stations, often leading to serious casualties, in which it is crucial for people to be able to escape from the staircases. In order to enable and guide the escape of people in underground floods, a staircase model with multiple rest platforms, applicable to common entrance and exit staircase forms, was constructed. The realizable k-ε turbulence model, coupled with a volume of fluid (VOF) method, was used to simulate and analyze the flow patterns when floods of various heights intrude into the structure. The effects of rest platform settings on the ejection phenomena and flow velocity changes in flood flows were summarized. The change rule of flood flow velocity on the stairs under different flood heights and stair heights was summarized, and a linear relationship between the peak flood flow velocity and the location of the peak flow velocity point on each flight of stairs was derived. Combined with the formula of the critical conditions for people to escape upwards in the flood, the proposed escape conditions for staircases with multiple rest platforms were proposed, which provide a basis for guiding the evacuation of people in times of disaster.

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