Abstract
Portugal and Spain have a cross-border cooperation protocol on wildfires response for a buffer strip of 25 km for each side of the border. In spite of the success of this collaboration, there are issues to be improved, since Portuguese and Spanish authorities use different methodologies to assess the daily fire danger. A methodology to harmonize fire danger and its interpretation by the Portuguese and Spanish Civil protection authorities in the transboundary buffer strip area is hereby presented. The fire danger index used is the Canadian Fire Weather Index (FWI), which requires input from meteorological data and gives an indication of fire intensity. The fire danger class is an important decision support tool for preventing and fighting wildfires. Since the meaning of FWI values change from region-to-region according to its specific characteristics, a calibration process was performed based on statistical data of the daily FWI values, the number of fires and burned area between 2005 and 2013. The results of the FWI calibration and harmonization of the data for the five danger classes minimizes the fire danger discrepancies across the border. This methodology has the potential to be reproduced in other areas.
Highlights
Several systems in studying the more favorable conditions for wildfire occurrence and spread were developed, in order to anticipate the daily fire occurrence and behavior [1,2], which may be incorporated in decision support tools and transferred to operational decisions
The Canadian Forest Fire Danger Rating System (CFFDRS) is the result of a research program conducted in Canada since 1968 [6] having as a main outcome the Canadian Forest Fire Weather Index System (CFFWIS) that was developed by Van Wagner in 1987 [7]
The FWI is only based on meteorological information, but we recognize that other factors affect fire ignition and spread, and the fire danger
Summary
Several systems in studying the more favorable conditions for wildfire occurrence and spread were developed, in order to anticipate the daily fire occurrence and behavior [1,2], which may be incorporated in decision support tools and transferred to operational decisions. These systems define a “Fire danger” index to support the management of fire prevention and fire suppression forces in each region. The FWI is only based on meteorological information, but we recognize that other factors (e.g., topography, vegetation cover, human activity, fire detection and suppression capacity) affect fire ignition and spread, and the fire danger.
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