Characteristics of Spatiotemporal Changes in the Occurrence of Forest Fires

Taehee Kim,Suyeon Hwang,Jinmu Choi

doi:10.3390/rs13234940

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to understand the characteristics of the spatial distribution of forest fire occurrences with the local indicators of temporal burstiness in Korea. Forest fire damage data were produced in the form of areas by combining the forest fire damage ledger information with VIIRS-based forest fire occurrence data. Then, detrended fluctuation analysis and the local indicator of temporal burstiness were applied. In the results, the forest fire occurrence follows a self-organized criticality mechanism, and the temporal irregularities of fire occurrences exist. When the forest fire occurrence time series in Gyeonggi-do Province, which had the highest value of the local indicator of temporal burstiness, was checked, it was found that the frequency of forest fires was increasing at intervals of about 10 years. In addition, when the frequencies of forest fires and the spatial distribution of the local indicators of forest fire occurrences were compared, it was found that there were spatial differences in the occurrence of forest fires. This study is meaningful in that it analyzed the time series characteristics of the distribution of forest fires in Korea to understand that forest fire occurrences have long-term temporal correlations and identified areas where the temporal irregularities of forest fire occurrences are remarkable with the local indicators of temporal burstiness.

Highlights

The frequency of forest fires has been increasing in Korea due to the phenomenon of high temperatures throughout the year and increases in the number of dry days [1,2]
In order to examine whether forest fire occurrence time series data in Korea follow the self-organized criticality (SOC) mechanism, this study examined whether the long-term temporal correlation and daily forest fire occurrence frequencies follow the power law distribution through
In order to alleviate the spatial limitations of point data in the forest fire occurrence information in the forest fire damage ledger, this study constructed forest fire damage range data in the form of polygons by combining the ledger information with Visual Infra-Red Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS)-based forest fire occurrence data

Summary

Introduction

The frequency of forest fires has been increasing in Korea due to the phenomenon of high temperatures throughout the year and increases in the number of dry days [1,2]. Forest fires that generally occur in time series can be explained with the concept of self-organized criticality (SOC). This is a concept that enables the understanding of the overall mechanism of a certain phenomenon by indicating that events in a system interact for a long time to make the system reach a certain critical state, which eventually causes the phenomenon [5]. The occurrence of forest fires can be explained by the SOC mechanism, the sizes of forest fires are diverse and their distribution follows the power law and shows temporal correlations [6,7]

Objectives

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion