Abdulaziz K Ghunaim
Assrary High School, Riyadh, Central, SAUDI ARABIA
In Saudi Arabia, people place metallic bars on windows of homes and residential buildings to secure them from burglaries. These shields are found to be very dangerous in case of a fire, due to obstructing inhabitants from using these windows as emergency exits. This results in significant delays in evacuation time in case of fire.
This research aims to find a solution to satisfy both requirements. First, reduce the time required for evacuating the building in case of emergencies to prevent fatalities and excessive damage. Second, maintain proper security measures to prevent unauthorized entries. This would be achieved using “Action Windows Shields†(AWS) based on the following hypothesis. If windows could be used as emergency exists, time for evacuating inhabitants would be reduced which would result in less number of fatalities and reduced damage to homes.
AWS enables regular window shields to be controlled (open/close) using flexible joints and an electrical lock mounted on top of windows frames. The lock is connected to fire smoke detector system via a control unit. The window lock would unlock automatically when fire is detected. Thus, allowing inhabitants and fire fighters to evacuate the building safely.
The hypothesis was tested using a sample of 20 different buildings (within each, 5 randomly selected spots were chosen for testing). The times needed to reach the nearest window and the nearest door were measured. The results showed that AWS significantly reduced the time required for evacuating building in case of emergencies by 55%. In addition, AWS maintained proper security measure for homes and buildings.