Diagnosing Lightning that Ignites Wildfires in the Western United States

Many lightning-ignited wildfires occur in remote areas and often dwell for a day or more resulting in delayed detection and an opportunity to identify them sooner. This study first describes a blended dataset that combines both satellite- and ground-based observations to better characterize the lightning that ignites wildfires and the environments where it occurs. Many weather, surface, and lightning characteristics are gathered for both ignition and null lightning strokes. This presentation then describes work towards developing an automated application for depicting the most hazardous lightning co-located with conditions conductive to wildland fire ignition.