Designing and producing a geographic information system to forecast vegetation fire danger according to weather conditions

Abstract

The article is concerned with the research and development of a geo information system for forecasting fire danger according to weather conditions. A structured approach is used to introduce the workflow process of the system in IDEF0 technique: generating data files/array, assessing the current fire danger, a spatial fire danger forecasted information and fire breaking-out, verifying the forecast index reliability and fire probability. The two-tiered architecture of a distributed data system and functional modules consisting of presentation logic, domain logic and database logic is focused on. Generation of meteorological data arrays is organized in a hypercube form and rated values of fire danger index. The surface planes of a hypercube include the month of fire danger season as well as the title and index of the weather station number, meteorological parameters and fire danger characteristics. The system is tested in the territory of the Jewish Autonomous Region in order to construct fire probability maps according to weather conditions using the developed geographic information system based on MapInfo Professional 15 and programming environments MapBasic and RAD Studio Delphi 2010. Forecast verification of fire danger index of three days lead-time amounts to 85% on the first day, it is 80%on the 2nd day, they are 70% and 65% on the third and fourth days respectively. The probability of vegetation fires in the territory of Birobidzhan subdivision of the JAR Forest Department is calculated depending on weather conditions. The forecast success rate is 75%.