Use of a prototype fire perimeter database for determining weather conditions conducive to large fire growth

Localized and landscape scale fire management, including planning, preparedness, and incident management, centers on understanding of fire potential as defined by historic, current, and predicted weather and climatology. Weather and climatology are used to assess fire danger and potential fire behavior. A national network of weather observations complete with data management standards has facilitated weather and climate analysis for individual incidents or planning units as well as analyses performed for larger geographic areas. However, readily available data correlating observed fire growth to weather only connects final fire size with weather observed on the reported start date of the fire; thus weather conditions or fire danger rating at the time of fire growth cannot be determined. Fire perimeters and fire behavior and weather observations are frequently recorded, but there are no national data standards nor is there a readily accessible repository for this data. We have created a prototype geodatabase of fire perimeter data for 58 fires in the northern Rocky Mountains. Entry was limited to large or long-duration fires for which multiple perimeters exist so that standardized fire perimeter data can be used to calculate fire progression and growth. Combining this information with weather data from remote automated weather stations (RAWS) and LANDFIRE land cover types, we demonstrate the utility of this dataset to determine (1) timing of large fire growth, (2) weather conditions conducive to large fire growth, and (3) fire danger rating indices associated with fire growth as compared to discovery date. Issues related to the creation of a national fire perimeter geodatabase are also explored.