Abstract: Unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) scheduling in emergency surveying and mapping (ESM) has complicated space and time constraints, with diverse scheduling schemes. The existing scheduling methods are generally based on human experience, and not reliable. In order to realize the rapid response of post disaster ESM, a fast scheduling method for UAV resources is proposed. The method comprehensively considers the constraints of the mission requirements, priorities, time windows, the geographical environment of the working area, and the ability of the UAV. A UAV scheduling model for ESM, is proposed that makes mission profit efficiency, mission completion rate, and scheduling risk as optimization objectives. This solution is based on ant colony algorithm. Experimental results verify the effectiveness of the scheduling method.