Modelling the Tactical Behaviour of the Australian Population in a Bushfire

In this paper we provide an agent-based model of the population behaviour during a bushfire in the state of Victoria in Australia, intended to serve as a basis for decision-support simulations for emergency managers. In order for the simulation results to be valid, our model therefore needs to be as realistic as possible, in particular regarding the agent architecture. After providing some context about the behaviour of the population of Victoria in the recent bushfires, we justify the need for a BDI architecture for the agents. Due to the lack of supporting tools for integrating such agents in simulations, we show how an existing methodology for modelling military tactics can be adapted in this context. The contribution of this paper is two-fold, providing an agent-based model of population behaviour during bushfires, and a methodology that can be used by other model designers in the field of crisis management. Mots-clés : Agent-based modelling and simulation, Agent behaviour models, Multi-agent methodologies, Belief-Desire-Intention (BDI) architecture.