In light of the tragic events at the World Trade Towers this week, I would like to offer an idea of equipping buildings of this size with parachutes to be used as a means of evacuation on the upper floors. I wonder how many of those people who jumped, and others who chose not to, could have been saved with the use of a parachute.
In addition to the parachute option of escape, which in my opinion, would only be feasible to a hieght of no lower than 60 stories,.. due to deployment time. Another method that should be used is shute escape. There now exists a tube like device used on oil rigs which is similar to sliding down the inside of a long netted stocking. It works perfectly on oil rigs from great hieghts, weather it would work at 60 or 80 stories is another matter but at the very least having "an option" for escape rather than face a plunge to your death or be incinerated by an unescapable fire is a decision any human being would surely like to have.
I absolutely agree with the idea of equipping workers in exceptionally high buildings with desktop 'parachute packs'. There may indeed be a high failure rate, but out of the 150 people who effectively freefell from the WTC, at least a fair proportion would have survived. After all, base jumpers parachute from far smaller structures.