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February 7, 2008

What’s the best way out of a skyscraper?

  • Inventors dream up personal escape devices for building evacuations, but experts say the future is strengthening stairs, elevators and even sky-bridges for escape.
    • By SHAWNA GAMACHE
    Journal Staff Reporter

    One idea for quickly exiting a tall building involves riding a cushion of air to safety.

    Dozens of patents have been granted for escape devices for high-rise buildings since the 2001 terrorist attacks felled the World Trade Center. Ideas include short-distance parachutes, stair gliders and chairs, elaborate pulleys modeled after construction site safety gear, and even a tube that its inventor claims would let people ride out of high-rises on a cushion of air.


     
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