Ankara : The Department of Industrial Engineering and the Graduate School of Engineering and Science of Bilkent University, 2013.Thesis (Master's) -- Bilkent University, 2013.Includes bibliographical references leaves 88-93.In this study, a methodology to provide emergency relief supplies to the disaster affected
regions is developed. As a result of destructive effects of disasters, debris, which is the
ruin and wreckage of the structures, occurs. Proper removal of debris has significant
importance since it blocks the roads and prohibits emergency aid teams to access the
disaster affected regions. Wrong disaster management, lack of efficiency and delays in
debris removal cause disruptions in providing sheltering, nutrition, healthcare and
communication services to the disaster victims, and more importantly they result in loss
of lives. Due to the importance of a systematic and efficient way of debris removal from
the point of improving disaster victims’ life quality and its contributions to
transportation of emergency relief materials to the disaster affected regions, the focus of
this study is providing emergency relief supplies to the disaster affected regions as soon
as possible, by considering unblocking operations of roads through removing the
accumulated debris.
To come up with a scientific solution methodology to the problem, mathematical models
that select the paths in order to transport emergency aid materials in the presence of
debris to the pre-determined disaster affected regions are developed. The performances
of the models are tested on two distinct data sets from İstanbul. Since it is crucial to act quickly in an emergency case, a constructive and an improvement heuristic are also
proposed.Şahin, HalenurM.S
