Best Evacuation Simulation Strategies—Analysis of a River Cruise Ship Case

Efficient evacuation constitutes an important factor in the context of cruise ship safety. As such, the creation of an emergency evacuation plan is crucial for the rapid and safe evacuation of all the occupants on a vessel. The main objective of this article is to evaluate and improve the evacuation process of a river cruise ship whose route is the ascent of the Douro River in Portugal. By means of Pathfinder software, 6 different scenarios were analysed to determine the shortest evacuation time, as well as identify points of congestion and bottlenecks. The simulation model was used to analyse the evacuation of 162 occupants (staff and passengers) from a cruise ship, assuming that there are 7 lifeboats, each with a capacity for 25 people. Strategy 1, with all the exit points available, including an operational elevator, was the strategy that presented the shortest total evacuation time, taking 159.6 s to complete the process.