Facilitating Disaster Knowledge Management with Agent-Based Modelling

Abstract

In developed countries, for recurring disasters (e.g. floods), there are dedicated document repositories of Disaster Management Plans (DISPLANs) that can be accessed as needs arise. Nevertheless, accessing the appropriate plan in a timely manner and sharing activities between plans often requires domain knowledge and intimate knowledge of the plans in the first place. In this paper, we introduce an Agent-Based (AB) knowledge analysis framework to convert DISPLANs into a collection of knowledge units that can be stored in a unified repository. The repository of DM actions then enables the mixing and matching knowledge between different plans. The repository is structured as a layered abstraction according to Meta Object Facility (MOF) to allow the free flow access to the knowledge across the layers. We use the flood DISPLAN of the SES (State Emergency Service), an authoritative DM agency in NSW (New State Wales) State of Australia to illustrate and validate the developed framework.