3D Path Planning and Scheduling for Urban Emergency UAV Operations Under Typhoon Disasters

With advances of low-altitude flight technology, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) leveraging their three-dimensional maneuverability and low dependence on ground infrastructure, have become an effective means to improve response efficiency in disaster emergency material delivery. Focusing on urban emergency material delivery in the context of typhoon disasters, this study develops a three-dimensional path planning model that jointly incorporates wind-field disturbances, dynamical energy consumption variations, and communication constraints, establishing a multi-objective optimization framework that couples energy consumption and timeliness. Path obstacle avoidance constraints were realized using 3D cuboid obstacle modeling and axis-aligned bounding box (AABB) intersection detection, and these constraints were embedded into the NSGA-Ⅱ multi-objective evolutionary algorithm. The algorithm was further enhanced via hybrid encoding and penalty mechanism. In the constructed urban building complex scenarios and complex wind-field environment, compared with the MOEA/D method, comparative experiments against MOEA/D show that the improved NSGA-Ⅱ achieves an average improvement in the Hypervolume (HV) indicator of approximately 67.6%, exhibits higher solution stability and yields a more widely distributed solution set, demonstrating superior algorithmic solving capability and stability. Three types of sensitivity experiments are conducted: wind speed variations, communication range changes, and the distribution of remote mission points. An adaptive dynamic scheduling mechanism is formulated for the initial emergency response phase, post-disaster recovery phase, and normal operation phase, providing theoretical support and technical reference for UAV emergency logistics scheduling under extreme weather conditions. This study offers key decision-making insights for integrating the low-altitude economy with resilient urban emergency management systems.