This article discusses the importance of evacuation routes from machinery spaces, and analyze their availability in the event of emergency cases, such as fire, flooding, toxic threat, terrorist attack on modern ships with spaces in the area of the engine room. It describes and provides an analysis of the course of action of escape from machinery spaces in typical cases of the actual fires on ships of the Polish and foreign flags. It identifies the main threats and reasons for causing the unavailability of escape routes, identifies factors of delay, or even prevent the evacuation of people from such spaces in the risk situation. It shows the current status of the relevant international rules and the requirements of classification societies concerning the number and structure of the main and emergency escape routes. It presents the current proposals for the revision of international rules concerning the number and structure of the escape routes from machinery spaces on ships
