A GIS – BASED OPTIMIZATION FOR THE FUEL LOCATION-ALLOCATION TO FACE THE PROBABLE TSUNAMI: CASE OF PADANG CITY

The Mentawai Megathrust is predicted to cause a tsunami with the tremendous effects to societies and environments. As the coastal area located across the epicenter, Padang City is expected to have a high vulnerability to be surged by this future hazard. This issue has gradually grown in importance to provide an effective disaster countermeasure for minimizing losses and suffering. As the fuel is one of the most critical items required in the aftermath of disaster, this study seeks to propose the disaster relief planning in Padang City, particularly in the fuel location-allocation decisions to cope with the effects caused by the probable tsunami. In this research the Geographic Information System (GIS)-based optimization is utilized to generate the appropriate number of facilities as well as its allocated capacity to serve several demand points (e.g. hospitals and refugee camps) during the emergency periods. This paper initially considers the potential inundation area based on the worst-case scenario developed by the disaster countermeasure agency to identify the likelihood of the impassable paths and the candidate facilities in the safe zone. By using P-Median analysis, this work recommends 9 strategic facilities to handle 18 demand points during the critical periods. This study provides an exciting opportunity to comprehensively obtain the suitable facilities in order to fulfill the fuel needs in the disaster aftermath. Due to practical constraints, this paper may be further improved to be Decisions Support Systems (DSS) with the consideration to the real time conditions during emergency periods.