Показано, что размещение многих тысяч человек на этажах современных высотных зданий, расположенных на высоких относительно земли уровнях, стало возможным только после изобретения безопасного в эксплуатации электрического лифта. Отмечено, что пожаронезащищенные лифтовые установки являются каналами интенсивного распространения опасных факторов пожара, поэтому долгое время для эвакуации людей предусматривались только незадымляемые лестничные клетки. Показано, что одновременная эвакуация всего населения высотного здания по лестничным клеткам продолжается несколько часов и не может обеспечить безопасности людей, в первую очередь из-за образования плотностей людских потоков 7-8 чел./м2. Выявлена высокая эффективность организации поэтапной комбинированной (пешеходной + пожарозащищенные лифты) эвакуации людей, что позволяет в разы сократить ее продолжительность и обеспечить движение людских потоков в лестничных клетках при плотностях, не превышающих 3 чел./м2. Выявлена смысловая идентичность терминов “эвакуация” и “спасение”, из-за казуистики трактовки которых отечественное противопожарное нормирование, запрещая использование лифтов в составе путей эвакуации, на протяжении десятилетий обрекает население высотных зданий на повышенную угрозу жизни при пожаре, а также является препятствием на пути внедрения современных прогрессивных технических средств и организационных решений для противопожарной защиты людей в высотных зданиях.
Pre-historic (with respect to the progress of elevator unit fire protection) understandings of the early last century, of CEOs of the national fire safety standardisation system like “Effected by high temperatures, elevator control gets out of order and elevators are blocked inside elevator shafts. It is impossible to quickly identify the elevator position when the power is switched off; the people being inside elevators, die” for decades such concept doomed population of multistoried buildings in our country to foot evacuation at forcedly deactivated elevator units. Recognition by the State programme “Accessible environment” 35 % of country population as disabled persons and persons with reduced mobility compelled them to permit using elevators for transporting fire-fighting units to rescue such people. However, as before, two thirds of multistoried building population are still forced to escape from fire hazard through staircases. At the same time, elevator units, not designated for transporting fire-fighting brigades, will be idle waiting, with open doors, at the ground floor; although, the fire protection level of both types of elevators is the same. The data provided in the article demonstrate that elevator units in the high-rise building must be not only the means which within everyday operation of high-rise buildings, provide for to all the demographic categories of the population accessibility of business and residential environment which is located hundreds of metres high from the ground level. They must guarantee as well availability of safety zones for them on the ground at occurrence of emergency situations as provided by the Technical Regulations on Safety of Buildings and Structures. In the meantime, this paradox turns into codes of regulations for designing and fire-safety protection of high-rise buildings, which development is funded by the Ministry of Construction, Housing and Utilities of the Russian Federation. To-date regulations of high-rise building fire safety must implement the requirement that automatic fire-extinguishing systems must extinguish fire inside premises prior to occurrence of critical values of fire hazards. In such a case, criteria of safe evacuation will be complied with throughout the evacuation ways, including elevators; thus, there will be excluded a necessity of getting out to burning building facade in search of escaping from impact of fire hazards using individual rescue means or mobile fire-rescue equipment, which is traditional for ideology of fire-fighting organisation. Currently, national manufacturers of fire-fighting protection and fire-extinguishing systems demonstrate a capability to ensure effective functioning of this system complex with a probability of 0.999. The fire-extinguishing systems being developed are intended to reveal these opportunities in designing practice - only then they will be in accordance with the Decree of the President of the Russian Federation dated 01.01.2018 No. 2 “On approval of Fundamentals of the State Policies of the Russian Federation in the area of fire safety for the period of up to 2010”.
The authors declare that there are no conflicts of interest present.