Hawkeye
Veteran Member
The SoCal dive boat disaster has me thinking about improving my escape systems. I have a working smoke alarm in the short passageway that connect two staterooms to a short ladder, then the galley, salon, and exit doors. However, I worry that a catastrophic situation would keep stateroom occupants trapped and needing to use the overhead hatches. Both hatches are large enough for normal sized people to get out but both require considerable strength to pull oneself out of. I'm thinking of building one simple, narrow ladder for each stateroom out of PVC tubing and hanging each on the inside of a stateroom closet door. Any thoughts? I'm thinking about a system that hooks over the hatch combing and reaches the floor in one room and the bed in the other. Any advice on size of tubing to carry the weight of a 200 lb person up and out?
