Emergency escape window

[woof-n]

I've often thought about making such a video. It really does sound like a useful tutorial to be made. As a firefighter, we practiced this technique as part of a firefighter survival technique.

Basically
1) Open window (unlatch it)
2) Get your head out (so you can breathe).
3) Shoulder into window frame and use arm to grasp a hold inside window.
4) Lean your body out with your head (hold on!) and your legs will follow.
5) While holding on (dangling) with one hand, you can push away with the other before you drop to avoid getting caught on something.

I like what you are saying... but..... I cant visualize when you are half way out, how to transition from upside down face first into side wall to a heads up position. I like to believe I could have maybe done this in my younger days when I was half the weight and twice the strength. Now I am twice the weight and half the strength.

If you make a video, you will be my hero.

 

[Gary RV_Wizard]

Basically
1) Open window (unlatch it)
2) Get your head out (so you can breathe).
3) Shoulder into window frame and use arm to grasp a hold inside window.
4) Lean your body out with your head (hold on!) and your legs will follow.
5) While holding on (dangling) with one hand, you can push away with the other before you drop to avoid getting caught on something.

I cannot picture this working for the size & shape of any of the RV exit windows I've had. Nor for the size & shape of many of us older RVers. Am looking forward to seeing your video...

 

[Kirk]

Nor for the size & shape of many of us older RVers.

That was my first thought as well.

Drop and hang with your arms fully extended and your feet will either be on the ground or only a foot or two above it.

Clearly you have very limited experience with RVs and their escape windows. Your process would simply not work with the travel trailer & escape window that we have traveled in for the past 10 years. That window is 3' wide and 2' tall and hinged at the top. To do what you suggest might be possible for a younger person of small girth, but I doubt that even they could exit head first successfully. Also, in very few travel trailers would the distance from the bottom of the window frame to the ground exceed 5' and most are less. There are many different types and designs of RV escape windows and I highly doubt that there are an regulations about their size, location, or ease of use.

Certainly not something you could practice weekly, but how many campers don't even know how to open that window.

Over the years that we have owned RVs, I think that by far the best escape window was in our class A that we were fulltime in. That window could be opened to practice via two red release handles and it hinged downward so that it then remained open due to gravity. There were 2 of them, both in the bedroom and one on either side of the bed and each one 30" tall and 36" wide. Our practice was to grab a blanket from the bed to pad the edge of the window and then exit feet first, using the bed for support as long as possible since it was only 18" from the outside walls. It was then just over 5' to the ground and while we only practiced one day, each exiting twice, I still consider that to have been the best RV emergency exit that we ever owned.

Our first travel trailer was a Great Divide that had an emergency exit window over the bed at the rear with our bed against that wall and the bumper about 4' or less below it. We never practiced with it but we were much younger and the main problem then would have been to get the 3 boys out.

 

[Larry N.]

As woof-n & Gary indicate above, all too many of us older experienced folks no longer have the body strength (or, often, small enough body size) to accomplish what you describe. I can tell you for a fact that I might have been able (given a large enough window) to do so 10 or 15 years back, but now both DW and I consider it an accomplishment if we can use a nearby table or chair to rise from the floor after getting down on our knees.

So while I may be able to do steps 1 through 3, steps 4 & 5 would either get us stuck in the window or have us landing on our noggins, neither of which is acceptable (obviously). Which, as I said in post #7 above, is a major part of the reason that we chose a Newmar with its actual emergency door exit (there's still a tiny emergency exit window in the bedroom, too, though not for us- we couldn't use it) in the rear.

 

[John From Detroit]

I cannot picture this working for the size & shape of any of the RV exit windows I've had. Nor for the size & shape of many of us older RVers. Am looking forward to seeing your video...

Worked for me on my RV I'm 6'3" about 300 pounds and if I were still in the RV I could still do it. But it was a large window and very well placed. As I said I had Tri-mark door locks. and thus had to go out the window.

 

[1stimerver]

How about a wall section that deploys a slide like the airlines use!!

 

[Domo]

Go out feet first while hanging onto the window sill.

That was my problem - DW can fold in half and go out feet first. I can't get my legs up over the little cabinets that are under the escape window at the same time. That's why I put in the grab bar to let me go out head first, grab the bar and slither out the window.

We had been taught to go out feet first in several rallies but I just can't fit into the 3' wide by 2' high space to angle both legs out - I could manage one... then I'm stuck.

 

[Ray-IN]

Mac the fire guy does not look like he could get out a window very easily. I would like to see him doing video demonstration rather than talking about it.

Sadly he passed away a few years ago. He was a retired professional firefighter. His RV mini-fire clinics were very informative, and he equally chose women and men to participate in demonstrations.
Domo; he recommended a small telescoping ladder stored in the bedroom. This is quickly setup outside the escape window for us old folks; you just hold it outside, hang onto the top rung and release the catch.
I'll try to find that video again.