PhD Mette Wagenvoort

Together with Kerry Malone and Martijn van Ee I am the daily supervisor of Mette Wagenvoort. She is working on the project Optimal planning of dispersed operations in urban coastal environments.

This is a joint project with TNO and The Netherlands Defence Academy.

Abstract of the Project Proposal

In this research we will focus on scheduling military operations in littoral environments. We will consider two phases of littoral operations, the ship-to-shore phase and the operation on land. In the ship-to-shore phase, resources have to be transported from amphibious warfare ships to land using smaller ships and connectors. In the operation on land tasks have to be executed. A new type of land operations which has not be quantitatively analysed are dispersed land operations. In dispersed land operations tasks are performed in smaller units while ensuring that units are close enough to neighbouring units such that units can help each other if necessary. A good planning for such operations can help in executing the tasks of the operation effciently as well as limit the risk of the operation.

In this research we aim to cover both aspects of the operation, the ship-to-shore phase and the (dispersed) operation on land. Some research has been done on optimising the ship-to-shore phase, however we will consider constraints that are not covered in these methods. Dispersed land operations has, to the authors’ knowledge, not been studied quantitatively yet. Studying this problem is of interest to give insight in the feasibility of using this type of land operations.

Research Output

• Mette Wagenvoort, Paul Bouman, Martijn van Ee, Tim Lamballais Tessensohn, Krzysztof Postek. An Exact and Heuristic Approach for the Ship-to-Shore Problem (2022, Working Paper)