Post-Fire Recovery Monitoring Using Remote Sensing: A Review

Abstract

Wildfires are a common disturbance factor, while climate change is thought to be one of the main causes of the fires. The detection of disturbance and post-fire recovery monitoring are vital for ecological research. This article aims to provide a review of current research of post-fire recovery monitoring based on remotely sensed data. While a close relationship between vegetation indices (Vis) and physiological parameters of vegetation has been established, VIs have become the main tool for assessing and monitoring vegetation status. Research on the effects and recovery from fires has been conducted by a number of authors, with VIs being used mainly in the methodologies. Tasseled Cap Transformation (TCT) method is also used to assess the state of the ecosystem before and after a fire. When viewed in series, Disturbance Index (DI) images provide an immediate way to recognize the pixels of the forests affected by the fire, different from those characteristic of the normal state of forests. The incorporation of various remote sensing data with field data is able to support the monitoring of post-fire effects and forest recovery.