Logistical Planning Problems in Disaster Relief: Simultaneous Operational Planning for RoadClearance Operations and Relief Distribution

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In the first days and weeks after a natural disaster struck (e.g. earthquake or tsunami), the most urgent task is to transport relief goods as well as search and rescue teams as fast as possible to the affected regions in order to alleviate the suffering of the disaster victims. In this first phase of disaster relief a fast and efficient relief distribution is regularly hampered by blocked roads. Because of fallen trees, landslides or debris parts of the road network are impassable, so that affected villages are completely cut off or vehicles have to make time-consuming detours to transport relief goods to these places.From a methodological point of view, two planning problems arise. On the hand relief goods have to be delivered as fast as possible with a fleet of capacity constrained vehicles. On the other hand the cooperative operation of clearance crews with different abilities and equipment has to be scheduled in order to clear blocked roads, so that these roads are passable for vehicles loaded with relief goods in a timely manner. Both planning problems are interdependent, as on the one side order and duration of the road clearance operations influence the speed of the relief distribution. On the other side visiting order and arrival times at the demand nodes within relief distribution have an effect on the scheduling of the road clearance operations. Thus, both planning problems have to be tackled simultaneously in an integrated approach, so that road clearance operations and relief distribution are coordinated in order to achieve an equal coverage of the disaster victims. Up to now only a few articles in the scientific literature have tackled this combined planning problem. Diverse relevant aspects of the problem have not yet been considered. Therefore, pursuing the development of mathematical models and solution algorithms for simultaneous planning of road clearance operations and relief distribution is the aim of this intended project.