Mission Load (menu item: Missions) defines how many missions occur per hour and category in a dispatch center. It is the foundation for:
the Projection (projected mission numbers per year and category),
the display cards "Missions in 24 Hours" (weekday, Saturday, and Sunday values),
the pie chart (Category Distribution),
and hourly mission generation in the simulation.
Field Overview
Each Mission Load entry consists of three fields:
Field | Description |
Category | The mission category this entry applies to. |
from Hour | From which time (0–23) this value applies. |
Amount | How many missions should occur in this time window. |
Categories
The following categories are available:
Display Name | Description |
Non-Urgent Patient Transport | Non-urgent patient transports. |
Urgent Patient Transport | Urgent ambulance service, emergency responses. |
Urgent Patient Transport (requires Doctor) | Urgent ambulance service requiring a physician. |
Firefighters | Fire and rescue operations. |
Intensive Care Patient Transport | Intensive care transports. |
Note: Categories that are disabled in the dispatch center settings (e.g., patient transport not activated) will not be triggered in the simulation, even if entries for that category exist.
How Time Windows Work
The system interprets entries as hourly intervals:
An entry with from Hour = 6 and Amount = 4 applies from 06:00 until the start of the next entry for that category (or until 24:00 if no further entry follows).
The entered amount describes how many missions should occur within this entire time window.
Example of an staggered daily curve:
from Hour | Amount | Time Window | Meaning |
0 | 1 | 00:00–06:00 | 1 mission in 6 hours (night) |
6 | 4 | 06:00–12:00 | 4 missions in 6 hours (morning) |
12 | 6 | 12:00–18:00 | 6 missions in 6 hours (afternoon) |
18 | 3 | 18:00–24:00 | 3 missions in 6 hours (evening) |
The Projection and the 24-hour card sum all windows of the day. In the above example, this results in: 1 + 4 + 6 + 3 = 14 missions per weekday for this category.
Options and Limitations
What is possible?
Multiple entries per category: Any number of time windows can be created per category to represent a realistic daily curve (e.g., morning peak, quiet night).
Configure different categories simultaneously: All categories are calculated and added independently.
Values from 0 to 500: The Amount field accepts integers from 0 to 500.
Hours from 0 to 23: The from Hour field accepts values from 0 to 23.
What is not possible / Limitations?
No duplicate hour values per category: Each hour may only occur once per category. A second entry for the same category and same start hour will be rejected.
No minute-level precision: The system works on an hourly basis. Finer resolutions are not possible.
No direct weekday filter in the Mission Load itself: Day-specific deviations (Saturday, Sunday) are not configured in the Mission Load, but via Missions on Weekend in the dispatch center settings (see below).
Intensive Care Patient Transport is not yet active in simulation: Entries for this category are considered in the projection displays, but SIM Dispatcher does not currently generate missions for ICU transports.
Weekend Reduction
In the general dispatch center settings under Missions on Weekend, percentage reductions for Saturday and Sunday can be configured:
Setting | Applies to |
Reduce Ambulance Saturday % | Urgent Patient Transport and Urgent Patient Transport (requires Doctor) |
Reduce Ambulance Sunday % | Urgent Patient Transport and Urgent Patient Transport (requires Doctor) |
Reduce Patient Saturday % | Non-Urgent Patient Transport |
Reduce Patient Sunday % | Non-Urgent Patient Transport |
Reduce ICU Transfer Saturday % | Intensive Care Patient Transport |
Reduce ICU Transfer Sunday % | Intensive Care Patient Transport |
A value of 100% means no reduction (full amount). A value of 80% means that on the respective day of the week, only 80% of the configured amount is applied.
The display cards "Missions in 24 Hours (Saturday)" and "Missions in 24 Hours (Sunday)" on the Mission Load page already consider these reductions.
Effect
How are missions planned?
SIM Dispatcher recalculates every hour how many missions should be triggered in the next hour:
The system checks all entries for the respective category that cover the current hour interval.
The proportion of the configured amount that applies to the current hour is calculated (proportional distribution).
If a time window spans multiple hours, only the corresponding fraction flows into the calculation for the current hour.
Saturday/Sunday reductions are automatically applied.
The result is a whole number — decimal places are randomly rounded up or down (stochastic rounding), so that even very low mission rates (e.g., 1 mission in 24 hours) are distributed correctly on average.
Example: An entry with from Hour = 0, Amount = 12, and a time window from 0–24:00 yields 0.5 missions per hour mathematically. In the simulation, each hour randomly decides whether 0 or 1 mission is triggered – on average, this results in 1 mission every 2 hours.
Resolution and Timing
The missions of an hour are distributed to random seconds within the hour (uniformly random between second 0 and 3599).
There is no fixed rhythm – missions can occur clustered or sporadically within the hour.
Effect of Weekend Reductions in Simulation
The percentage weekend reductions from the dispatch center settings are fully considered in the simulation as well. On a Sunday with Reduce Ambulance Sunday % = 50, on average half as many missions are triggered for urgent ambulance/doctor transports as on a weekday.
Best Practices
Stagger daily curve realistically: Instead of a single entry for the entire night/day, 3–5 entries per category are recommended that reflect a typical low-load night and peak times during the day.
No entry = no missions: If no entry exists for a category, SIM Dispatcher generates no missions for that category. The projection display then shows "0".
Use Amount = 0 explicitly: With an entry Amount = 0, a time period can be explicitly set to "no missions" without deleting the previous entry (e.g., no patient transport between 22:00 and 06:00).
Keep total number in view: The cards "Missions in 24 Hours" (weekday, Saturday, Sunday) and the Projection on the page immediately show how changes affect the annual projection.
Add weekend reductions: The Mission Load describes a typical weekday. Seasonal or weekday-specific deviations on Saturday/Sunday should always be configured via the dispatch center settings (Missions on Weekend).