The process of evacuating people from a building or an area that is not safe.
Evacuation refers to the emptying of a building or space which people or animals inhabit in the event of an emergency to protect them from danger. Evacuation is necessary for areas where there is an imminent threat to public safety or property. An individual who is removed from a hazardous area is known as an evacuee.
Evacuations occur on both smaller and larger scales, from the evacuation of a building during a fire to entire city-wide evacuations in the event of a hurricane or a military attack. One historic evacuation that has been in the news again recently was the evacuation of Allied troops from Dunkirk during World War II. Natural disasters such as floods, earthquakes, tsunamis or volcano eruptions can lead to mass evacuations, while other causes include terrorist attacks, structural failures and disease outbreaks.
Thousands of people have been evacuated from France’s Mediterranean coast due to the outbreak of wildfire, with as many as 12,000 people forced to abandon the area as firefighters tackle the inferno. The blaze began in forests in the Côte d’Azur region late on Tuesday night but areas as far apart as Corsica, Italy, Portugal and Albania have also been affected.
