Join us in welcoming our own Russ Nelson, OR Ph.D. student, as he will discuss operations research applications in US Army.
https://ncsu.zoom.us/rec/share/Z0oe4FnsKG3GfKBC0V6A6RGCJb78AE16vrfjhP21Y9BP1WPD7aP7NU3SK2agorXa.-laXaMH90vvdqClc
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Operations Research Applications in US Army Aviation Air Movement Operations
Although lacking the same preeminent status of air assault planning, air movement operations comprise a majority of Army utility and cargo helicopter combat aviation operations regarding the volume of customers and the endless appetite for rapid movement of troops across the battlespace. We propose an Army aviation air movement mission planning model to assist the mission planner by rapidly providing courses of action based on the commander's priorities. Features of the problem include priority demand, multi-node refueling, aircraft, and passenger time windows, maximum passenger transportation time, the minimization of unsupported demand, aircraft utilization, and total flight time. The mathematical model is an extension of the dial-a-ride problem (DARP) that will coordinate air mission requests (AMRs) at the aviation task force level or lower to generate courses of action that optimize helicopter fleet resourcing and routing decisions against mission variables while supporting the optimal number of AMRs that sustain combat power over time. Additional work includes a heuristic improvement and analysis required to generate feasible solutions in near real-time. Furthermore, we propose an Army aviation two-stage stochastic programming model to allocate utility helicopters across areas of operations separated task forces to minimize routing costs and the number of unsupported air movement AMRs by priority level.
Russ is a US Army operations research/systems analyst (ORSA), former Army aviator, and current Ph.D. candidate in the Operations Research Program at NC State. His previous roles have included assault helicopter platoon leader and company commander, Army aviation doctrine developer, and assistant professor in the Department of Mathematical Sciences at the United States Military Academy (USMA) at West Point. Prior to joining NC State, he worked with statisticians in creating designs of experiments and conducting statistical analysis at the Army Evaluation Center in support of the Army Test and Evaluation Command. Upon graduation from NC State, he will return to an assistant professor role at USMA.
