New AI Model Shows How to Evacuate for Fires One Safe Step at a Time

NIST researchers developed a new AI model that can identify safe evacuation routes during a fire. The model can be used with new electronic exit signs, called dynamic emergency exit displays, to show whether an exit is safe to use.

A fire alarm jolts you from your office desk, and you head for the nearest exit. But what if the closest exit has already been blocked by the fire?

Researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and their colleagues have developed a new AI model called Safe Step that can redirect occupants to the safest evacuation route in a fire. Described in the Journal of Building Engineering, the model can be used with electronic displays to show whether an exit is safe to use. 

“Fires can grow and spread,” said Hongqiang “Rory” Fang, a research associate at NIST and first author of the journal paper. “Our model forecasts how the fire is evolving and can help update emergency exit displays to direct people toward the safest exit.”

Safe Step can be used in “smart” buildings, where sensors monitor real-time environmental conditions, such as temperature and air quality. Some of these buildings are testing a new technology called a dynamic emergency exit display, which can indicate that the exit is safe to use or point arrows to a safer route out of the building.

Previous research has proposed using traditional algorithms to find the shortest path for safely evacuating a building fire. However, these algorithms depend entirely on current building conditions and do not consider the cumulative hazards that evacuees can face along the route.