title: Directional navigation improves opportunistic communication for emergencies.
abstract: We present a novel direction based shortest path search algorithm to guide evacuees during an emergency. It uses opportunistic communications (oppcomms) with low-cost wearable mobile nodes that can exchange packets at close range of a few to some tens of meters without help of an infrastructure. The algorithm seeks the shortest path to exits which are safest with regard to a hazard, and is integrated into an autonomous Emergency Support System (ESS) to guide evacuees in a built environment. The algorithm proposed that ESSs are evaluated with the DBES (Distributed Building Evacuation Simulator) by simulating a shopping centre where fire is spreading. The results show that the directional path finding algorithm can offer significant improvements for the evacuees.
authors.affiliation: Intelligent Systems and Networks Group, Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Imperial College, London SW72AZ, UK. kokand@gmail.com.
authors.forename: Andras
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Kokuti
authors.affiliation: Intelligent Systems and Networks Group, Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Imperial College, London SW72AZ, UK. e.gelenbe@imperial.ac.uk.
authors.forename: Erol
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Gelenbe
mesh_terms: D000465:Algorithms; D003142:Communication; D004189:Disaster Planning; D004190:Disasters; D004630:Emergencies; D006801:Humans; D018635:Rescue Work / Q000379:methods*