ABSTRACT
The Finnish Lifeboat Institution operates an extensive network of Search and Rescue Units (SRUs) across the Finnish maritime and lacustrine areas, operated by volunteers. Recent interest in fleet renewal sparked the question which SRU types would be most suitable for the operations in the Gulf of Finland. There is a desire to operate a cost-effective, reliable and highly performant fleet. This study gives an account of advances in the construction of a simulation model aimed at evaluating the response characteristics of the maritime voluntary sea rescue system. The simulation model is driven by a historical incident data, augmented with wave data and expert-elicited SRU characteristics. The model aims at providing some elements of decision support with regard to the required number of vessels in each station, given certain performance requirements.
