Thesis
Modeling the spatial distribution of lightning fires on two national forests
Washington State University
Master of Science (MS), Washington State University
2009
Handle:
https://hdl.handle.net/2376/103327
Abstract
Forest fire ignitions on National forest lands have many causes; however lightning remains the most consistent ignition source. By understanding the spatial distribution of lightning fires over a sixty-five year temporal scale allows fire and timber managers to gain a better understanding of how to spatially locate, and manage, fuel treatments on these forests. It is hypothesized that elevation plays a significant role in the probability of a lightning strike igniting a forest fire given acceptable climatic and fuel conditions. The two study areas were chosen for several reasons; first, fire suppression data was available across a similar temporal scale for both forests. Second, the Gallatin National Forest in Montana provides a platform to test this hypothesis in a Pinus contorta dominated, high severity fire regime, while the Willamette National Forest in Oregon provides a mixed-conifer mixed severity fire regime. Additionally, these two forest types provide over two million acres upon which to test our point process model. An inhomogeneous Poisson cluster point process model was developed to describe the spatial distribution of lightning-caused fires as a function of elevation on the Gallatin and Willamette National Forests. The results of this study provide a range of elevations at which the probability of a lightning strike igniting a forest fire is significantly higher on each forest. On the Willamette National Forest, elevations between 700m and 1600m have the highest ignition probability, while the Gallatin National Forest high probability elevations ranged between 2300m to 2600m. Managers of these two forests, as well as managers of similar forest types, can focus attention at these elevations for both fuel reduction efforts as well as urban interface fire suppression efforts.
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Details
- Title
- Modeling the spatial distribution of lightning fires on two national forests
- Creators
- Sara H. Brown
- Contributors
- Richard Gill (Degree Supervisor)
- Awarding Institution
- Washington State University
- Academic Unit
- Environment, School of the (CAHNRS)
- Theses and Dissertations
- Master of Science (MS), Washington State University
- Publisher
- Washington State University; Pullman, Wash. :
- Identifiers
- 99900525067901842
- Language
- English
- Resource Type
- Thesis