Incorporating Drought Information into Wildland Fire Management
Applications: Recent Research and Tool Development in California and Nevada
Dan McEvoy, Desert Research Institute & Western Regional
Climate Center
Monday, 12 August 2019
1
1:00 a.m. AKDT
Despite a clear link between drought and wild fire, there is currently a lack of information for stakeholders at the regi onal and local levels for improved wildfire risk management using drought e arly warning information. Fire managers and other specialized fire professi onals, such as Incident Meteorologists, will increasingly need to effective ly use drought information in forecasts of fire behavior at fire incidents, and in long-term planning (i.e., seasonal fire potential outlooks) as the climate continues to warm along with shifts in the timing and duration of f ire seasons. This presentation will highlight recent efforts to incorporate drought-wildfire linkages into the National Integrated Drought Information System (NIDIS) California-Nevada Drought Early Warning System. Research fi nds that drought indices which are both multi-scalar and incorporate evapor ative demand are most strongly correlated to fuel moisture and key results will be presented. Testing of the Evaporative Demand Drought Index (EDDI) w as conducted by Predictive Services in Northern California during the 2018 fire season and feedback will be summarized. Finally, Dan will summarize we b tools that have been developed (and some that are still in development) t o access EDDI, other drought indices, and remote sensing data (often with g lobal coverage) that can potentially benefit wildland fire management in Al aska. This will focus on EDDI tools developed at NOAA’s Physical Science Di vision and Climate Engine developed jointly between the Desert Research Ins titute and University of Idaho.
This webinar is jointly sponsored wit h the Alaska Fire Science Consortium and will use their webinar platform.
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Webinar webpage