Resource redistribution after large scale disasters: Case with gradually updated information

Abstract

The problem of fast supply of affected cites with vital resources after a large scale disaster is under consideration. It is one of the essential components of the short-term recovery characterized by highly probable uncertainty in evaluating the state of damaged region. We propose a general principle by which the required redistribution of vital resources between the affected and neighboring cities can be efficiently implemented under such conditions. The developed principle, first, uses the triage concept determining the current city priority in the resource delivery. Second, it minimizes the delivery time subjected to this priority. Finally a certain plan of the resource redistribution is generated. A particular case when the initial communication system has crashed and formation of a new one and the resource redistribution proceed synchronously is studied numerically. The obtained results enable us to regard the resource redistribution plan governed by the proposed method as semi-optimal and rather efficient especially under uncertainty.