Panic contagion and the evacuation dynamics

Abstract

Panic may spread over a crowd in a similar fashion as contagious diseases do in social groups. People no exposed to a panic source may express fear, alerting others of imminent danger. This social mechanism initiates an evacuation process, while affecting the way people try to escape. We examined real life situations of panic contagion and reproduced these situations in the context of the Social Force Model. We arrived to the conclusion that two evacuation schemes may appear, according to the \textit{stress} of the panic contagion. Both schemes exhibit different evacuation patterns and are qualitatively visible in the available real life recordings of crowded events. We were able to quantify these patterns through topological parameters. We further investigated how the panic spreading gradually stops if the source of danger ceases.