Bushfire Management Research Articles

Estimating Fire Weather Indices Via Semantic Reasoning Over Wireless Sensor Network Data Streams

Wildfires are frequent, devastating events in Australia that regularly cause significant loss of life and widespread property damage. Fire weather indices are a widely-adopted method for measuring fire danger and they play a significant role in issuing bushfire warnings and in anticipating demand for bushfire management resources. Existing systems that calculate fire weather indices are limited due to low spatial and temporal resolution. Localized wireless sensor networks, on the other hand, gather continuous sensor data measuring variables such as air temperature, relative humidity, rainfall and wind speed at high resolutions. However, using wireless sensor networks to estimate fire weather indices is a challenge due to data quality issues, lack of standard data formats and lack of agreement on thresholds and methods for calculating fire weather indices. Within the scope of this paper, we propose a standardized approach to calculating Fire Weather Indices (a.k.a. fire danger ratings) and overcome a number of the challenges by applying Semantic Web Technologies to the processing of data streams from a wireless sensor network deployed in the Springbrook region of South East Queensland. This paper describes the underlying ontologies, the semantic reasoning and the Semantic Fire Weather Index (SFWI) system that we have developed to enable domain experts to specify and adapt rules for calculating Fire Weather Indices. We also describe the Web-based mapping interface that we have developed, that enables users to improve their understanding of how fire weather indices vary over time within a particular region.Finally, we discuss our evaluation results that indicate that the proposed system outperforms state-of-the-art techniques in terms of accuracy, precision and query performance.

Land Use Planning and Bushfire Risk: CFA Referrals and the February 2009 Victorian Fire Area

The Victoria Planning Provisions (VPPs) include siting and design regulations incorporated into local government planning schemes to mitigate risk in areas prone to bushfires. Introduced in 1997, these provisions were previously called the Wildfire Management Overlay (WMO). Now updated and renamed the Bushfire Management Overlay (BMO), the provision's ongoing development has been informed by fire behaviour and how houses ignite. The aim of the research reported here, conducted following the catastrophic February 2009 Victorian fires, was to review dwelling losses in terms of the WMO's effectiveness. Empirical evidence compares house losses of dwellings referred to the Country Fire Authority (CFA) via the WMO, with overall house losses. The results suggest that proportionately fewer houses referred to the CFA were lost, compared with those not assessed under the WMO. It should be noted that other factors influenced the results, such as the houses assessed under the WMO being generally newer.

Analysis of Collaborative Communication for Linguistic Cues of Cognitive Load

Analyses of novel linguistic and grammatical features, extracted from transcribed speech of people working in a collaborative environment, were performed for cognitive load measurement Prior studies have attempted to assess users' cognitive load with several measures, but most of them are intrusive and disrupt normal task flow. An effective measurement of people's cognitive load can help improve their performance by deploying appropriate output and support strategies accordingly. The authors studied 33 members of bushfire management teams working collaboratively in computerized incident control rooms and involved in complex bushfire management tasks. The participants' communication was analyzed for some novel linguistic features as potential indices of cognitive load, which included sentence length, use of agreement and disagreement phrases, and use of personal pronouns, including both singular and plural pronoun types. Results showed users' different linguistic and grammatical patterns with various cognitive load levels. Specifically, with high load, people spoke more and used longer sentences, used more words that indicated disagreement with other team members, and exhibited increased use of plural personal pronouns and decreased use of singular pronouns. The article provides encouraging evidence for the use of linguistic and grammatical analysis for measuring users' cognitive load and proposes some novel features as cognitive load indices. The proposed approach may be applied to many data-intense and safety-critical task scenarios, such as emergency management departments, for example, bushfire or traffic incident management centers; air traffic control rooms; and call centers, where speech is used as part of everyday tasks.

The gendered dimensions of bushfire in changing rural landscapes in Australia

This paper examines gender differences in awareness, preparedness and attitudes towards bushfire amongst landholders in rural landscapes affected by amenity-led in-migration in southeast Australia. It considers the potential of conceptualising bushfire not as a gender-neutral natural phenomenon but as an important means by which traditional gender roles and power relations within rural landscapes are maintained. Landholders were found to uphold conventional views of bushfire management as “men’s business” despite changing social circumstances. Consequently, key gender differences exist within landholders’ bushfire risk awareness, bushfire knowledge, the perceived need for bushfire preparedness measures, the willingness to perform certain tasks, and the belief in personal capacity to act. We argue that covert and less visible as well as overt gender roles and traditions are important factors in understanding landholders’ engagement with bushfire management. When gendered dimensions of bushfire are investigated in the context of hegemony, a paradox emerges between women choosing not to take control of their own bushfire safety and women being denied the opportunity to take control. The complex and contradictory actions and attitudes to bushfire that materialise through an analysis of gendered social experiences complicate attempts to create more gender-sensitive frameworks for bushfire management. The tenacious and embedded nature of gender role divisions within both public and private spheres was furthermore found to act as economic, social and political stumbling blocks for empowerment opportunities. Using a mixed-methods research approach, this paper maps out gendered dimensions of bushfire through landholders’ narratives and actions. The implications of these dimensions for bushfire management have direct relevance to recent international discussions of the vulnerability of the growing number of people living in bushfire-prone rural–urban interface areas.

Bushfire Management: Where, Why and How Economics Matters

Bushfire Management: Where, Why and How Economics Matters

Submission to The 2009 Victorian Bushfires Royal Commission

Summary The Institute of Foresters of Australia (IFA) is an independent, national body representing forest scientists, technicians and managers with professional and practical expertise. Bushfires are a day-to-day preoccupation of many of the Institute's members either through their practical work in the forest, or through involvement in research or the administration of forest management agencies or companies. Most foresters have had personal responsibility for bushfire mitigation and suppression at some stage during their career. The IFA regards the current bushfire situation in Victoria as deeply unsatisfactory and believe this is reflected by the damage, devastation and cost of forest fires since 2003. We have for some time felt that the situation would not improve until there was a major stock-take of the current approach which has become skewed firmly in favour of ‘emergency bushfire response’ at the expense of traditional fire prevention activities. We sincerely hope that this Royal Commission will be the vehicle for a sensible revision of this approach. The IFA has long advocated the need for a national policy on bushfire mitigation and suppression in order for Australia to more satisfactorily manage bushfire risk2. This would cover bushfire prevention and fire management which then flows on into state jurisdictions. This approach should be directed at minimising the cost of bushfires in terms of human life and valuable assets (including environmental assets), must be based on science, experience and facts, and should allow for cooperation and coordination across states and across land tenures. In our view a primary objective should be to place responsibility for bushfire management in the hands of land managers, both public and private, not emergency services. A critical ingredient which is lacking is political leadership. We have observed major changes in forest management policies across Australia in recent years, and this has been magnified in Victoria where for at least the past decade there has been a political focus on expanding national parks and conservation reserves. The fact that 52% of Victoria's public lands are now contained in these tenures has led to a profound change in management focus away from active treatment to meet more passive conservation aims. With respect to bushfire management, this has led to a loss of fire management expertise, greater restrictions to public access due to track closures and declining levels of maintenance, and a demonstrable reduction in the broadscale use of prescribed fire as a management tool to mitigate the impact of summer bushfires. This combination of factors has allowed forest fuels to accumulate to an extent that has raised the intensity of summer bushfires and increasingly forced a greater reliance on emergency fire-fighting. This has occurred at a time when there has been an increasing development of housing in bushfire-prone areas, both making the use of prescribed burning more difficult on adjacent public lands and further entrenching the need for emergency capability to preserve life and property at the public-private land interface when it is inevitably threatened by fire. The IFA sees a requirement to develop building codes for homes in fire-prone areas along with providing adequate separation between homes and bushland fuels (both public and private) and to maintain gardens and surrounds in a condition of low flammability. Properly prepared homeowners can do much to reduce bushfire damage and we believe they should be given legislated rights to do what is required to best protect their own property in the event of fire. This submission reviews the background to the bushfire situation in Victoria and responds to the Royal Commission's terms of reference. In total, we have made 44 recommendations in responding to the terms of reference (TOR). These are contained in sections which separately address each TOR. In addition we offer nine over-arching recommendations. This submission is accompanied by copies of the Institute of Foresters of Australia's national policies on bushfire management and the ecological role of fire in Australian forests and woodlands (Appendices 1 and 2).

Modernising policy for public value: Learning lessons from the management of bushfires

This article highlights the need for an inclusive and integrated policy-making model by drawing on the experiences of the bushfire fighting efforts of community, business and government bodies during the bushfires that ravaged North-East Victoria during January and February of 2003 and the delivery of recovery assistance since the fires. These experiences revealed some shortfalls which militated against delivering public value for the communities affected during and after the fires. A policy framework has been developed in light of these shortfalls and is used here to reveal the ways in which bushfire management policy and practice needs to be 'modernised' if arrangements in the future are to deliver public value.(1)

Inquiries following the 2002–2003 Australian bushfires: common themes and future directions for Australian bushfire mitigation and management

Summary Major bushfires in south-eastern Australia in the 2002–2003 bushfire season caused the loss of ten lives, substantial damage both to rural and urban property and to infrastructure and primary production systems, and had significant environmental impacts. The scale and impacts of the fires prompted the governments of the Australian Capital Territory and Victoria to establish inquiries into the bushfires in their jurisdictions, and the federal House of Representatives and Council of Australian Governments to establish inquiries with wider terms of reference. This paper reviews the outcomes of these inquiries in the context of the most wide-ranging, that of the Council of Australian Governments (COAG), which the authors conducted. The inquiries which followed the 2002–2003 bushfire season explored many of the common themes which had emerged from the preceding 13 inquiries into significant bushfire events in Australia since 1939. These include the importance of risk reduction, particularly through fuel reduction; of community education; of the role of volunteer firefighters; of local knowledge and of access for firefighting; and of the adequacy of resources for bushfire mitigation and management. While emphases varied, there was broad agreement amongst the four 2002–2003 inquiry processes about key actions necessary to improve bushfire mitigation and management: more pervasive and effective community education; decision-making within a risk management framework; improving governance and coordination; and supporting and sustaining the role of volunteer firefighters. All inquiries focused, to varying degrees, on the limits of knowledge and information, and how that might be addressed; on the importance of improved development planning and building design; on the role of landscape-scale fuel reduction burning in reducing risk; and on improving bushfire response and recovery processes. The inquiries agreed there was both scope and need for more effective fuel reduction burning to protect natural as well as other assets. However, as the Victorian Inquiry noted, this is ‘not necessarily about burning substantially more land, but rather, burning smarter’. The COAG Inquiry developed an indicative set of national bushfire principles, which it suggested should form the basis for future Australian bushfire policy, and COAG has since undertaken to develop a final set of principles based on these.

Urban governance and vulnerability: exploring the tensions and contradictions in Sydney’s response to bushfire threat

This paper explores Sydney’s vulnerability to bushfire hazard. Despite the inevitability of bushfires and challenge posed to the urban interface by significant demographic pressures, there remains a mismatch between reactive technological fixes and proactive social programs. Extensive bushfires have caused significant damage across Sydney in recent years and have led to an increasing need to explore the range of measures and agents involved in bushfire management. The following analysis focuses on aspects of the governance framework and questions the adequacy of current policy and action, revealing the contradictions and tensions inherent in contemporary approaches.

How Organisational Change is Contributing to a Sustainable Bushfire Program

AbstractThe Nature Conservation Council of NSW (NCC)'s Bushfire Program is unique amongst conservation organisations. The Program has been running for over ten years, focusing its campaign work mainly on government policy, legislation and commissions of inquiry. However, the Program was originally initiated to provide support to over 70 conservation representatives on bushfire management committees (from state to regional levels)In 2003, the Community Bushfire Education Project (CBEP), which is funded by the Environment Trust (ET), was developed as an extension of the Bushfire Program. The CBEP's main focuses have included coordinating community and professional workshops, field trips and school visits.The design and advocacy principles of the Bushfire Program have been significantly influenced by the CBEP. Principles associated with Education for Sustainability, including capacity building, partnerships and critical thinking, have been key drivers in this.Traditionally, the NCC Bushfire Program has been a strong advocate of enforcing environmental assessment and controls through regulation. However, to date, bushfire regulations have only had limited success in changing unsustainable practices. We have learnt that a complimentary approach to regulation is voluntary action. This entails a participatory approach to bushfire management planning. We feel this change in philosophy can apply to all land management and environmental issues and may parallel a larger shift within the environment movement.Through this paper we will show how the Bushfire Program has developed to incorporate community education as a central pillar of, rather than in addition to, its core campaign; the difficulties this presents and the strengths it provides. The NCC now sees community participation and empowerment as a key component of any natural resource management campaign.

Bushfire Management, Culture and Ecological Modernisation in Ghana

Bushfire Management, Culture and Ecological Modernisation in Ghana

The Cultural Politics of Resource Management: the Case of Bushfires in a Conservation Reserve

Recent bushfire events have seen a rise in conflict over bushfire management in south Australia. A case study from Kangaroo Island illustrates the conflict between the rural community and the National Parks and Wildlife Service. The debate is ostensibly concerned with the effectiveness of bushfire management strategies employed in reserves. Inquiry reveals, however, that the conflict is underlain by cultural and social tensions. These issues concern the protagonists' relationship with the Kangaroo Island landscape and recent land management changes. The autonomy and role of the rural community in the landscape has been challenged by these globalising trends in land management. Through the bushfire issue the community is seeking to reassert its position on Kangaroo Island as creator and steward of the landscape.

Why burn the bush? Social approaches to bush-fire management in West African national parks

Fire is a major threat to many national parks worldwide. Social research in the savanna woodland biome of northern Benin shows that in addition to the commonly cited reasons for setting bush-fires—tradition, clearing fields, hunting, and improving dry season grazing—villagers burn to deter wild animals, to increase the supply of certain forest products, and to take revenge on the national parks. Villagers' perceptions of the effects of fire often correspond to our scientific understanding. With an appreciation of the villagers' logic we can predict that the establishment and protection of national parks will increase the incidence of human-caused bush-fires. To counter this, parks need to promote changes in long-standing traditions, encourage more intensive land-use practises, assist in protecting crops and livestock against wild animals, and improve relationships with the surrounding villagers.

The Australian National Bushfire model project

The National Bushfire Research Unit has developed a personal computer based model to act as a shell for a decision support system for bushfire management. To date the fire spread module has been developed, and there is a continuing programme to incorporate expert systems. The model is designed for real-time operation. Inputs to the model combine a geographic information system (GIS) with real-time data acquisition and data assimilation through modem connections to telephone lines. Outputs are graphical and allow the fire-front position, which is generated using Huygens' principle, to be examined at any desired scale.