Research Database
Displaying 21 - 40 of 114
Carbon emissions from the 2023 Canadian wildfires
Year: 2024
The 2023 Canadian forest fires have been extreme in scale and intensity with more than seven times the average annual area burned compared to the previous four decades. Here, we quantify the carbon emissions from these fires from May to September 2023 on the basis of inverse modelling of satellite carbon monoxide observations. We find that the magnitude of the carbon emissions is 647 TgC (570–727 TgC), comparable to the annual fossil fuel emissions of large nations, with only India, China and the USA releasing more carbon per year. We find that widespread hot–dry weather was a principal…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Mental Health and Traumatic Occupational Exposure in Wildland Fire Dispatchers
Year: 2024
Wildland fire dispatchers play a key role in wildland fire management and response organization; however, to date, wildland fire studies have largely focused on the physical hazards and, to a lesser extent, mental health hazards of wildland firefighting operational personnel, and dispatcher studies have primarily focused on 911 and police dispatchers. Studies of other dispatchers have provided some limited insight into potential strains impacting this workforce, including work-related fatigue, burnout, and traumatic exposure. However, the specific job hazards that are faced by wildland fire…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Characterising ignition precursors associated with high levels of deployment of wildland fire personnel
Year: 2024
BackgroundAs fire seasons in the Western US intensify and lengthen, fire managers have been grappling with increases in simultaneous, significant incidents that compete for response resources and strain capacity of the current system.AimsTo address this challenge, we explore a key research question: what precursors are associated with ignitions that evolve into incidents requiring high levels of response personnel?MethodsWe develop statistical models linking human, fire weather and fuels related factors with cumulative and peak personnel…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Human driven climate change increased the likelihood of the 2023 record area burned in Canada
Year: 2024
In 2023, wildfires burned 15 million hectares in Canada, more than doubling the previous record. These wildfires caused a record number of evacuations, unprecedented air quality impacts across Canada and the northeastern United States, and substantial strain on fire management resources. Using climate models, we show that human-induced climate change significantly increased the likelihood of area burned at least as large as in 2023 across most of Canada, with more than two-fold increases in the east and southwest. The long fire season was more than five times as likely and the large areas…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Retention of highly qualified wildland firefighters in the Western United States
Year: 2024
Federal agencies responsible for wildland fire management face increasing needs for personnel as fire seasons lengthen and fire size continues to grow, yet federal agencies have struggled to recruit and retain firefighting personnel. While many have speculated that long seasons, challenging working conditions, and low wages contribute to recruitment and retention challenges, there has been…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Bacterial Emission Factors: A Foundation for the Terrestrial-Atmospheric Modeling of Bacteria Aerosolized by Wildland Fires
Year: 2024
Wildland fire is a major global driver in the exchange of aerosols between terrestrial environments and the atmosphere. This exchange is commonly quantified using emission factors or the mass of a pollutant emitted per mass of fuel burned. However, emission factors for microbes aerosolized by fire have yet to be determined. Using bacterial cell concentrations collected on unmanned aircraft systems over forest fires in Utah, USA, we determine bacterial emission factors (BEFs) for the first time. We estimate that 1.39 × 1010 and 7.68 × 1011 microbes are emitted for each Mg of biomass consumed…
Publication Type: Journal Article
The cost of operational complexity: A causal assessment of pre-fire mitigation and wildfire suppression
Year: 2024
Pre-fire mitigation efforts that include the installation and maintenance of fuel breaks are integral to wildfire suppression in Southern California. Fuel breaks alter fire behavior and assist in fire suppression at strategic locations on the landscape. However, the combined effectiveness of fuel breaks and wildfire suppression is not well studied. Using daily firefighting personnel to proxy the quantity and diversity of potential fire suppression operations (i.e., operational complexity), we examined 15 wildfires from 2017 to 2020 in the Los Padres, Angeles, San Bernardino, and Cleveland…
Publication Type: Journal Article
From flexibility to feasibility: identifying the policy conditions that support the management of wildfire for objectives other than full suppression
Year: 2024
Background. Intentional management of naturally ignited wildfires has emerged as a valuable tool for addressing the social and ecological consequences of a century of fire exclusion in policy and practice. Policy in the United States now allows wildfires to be managed for suppression and other than full suppression (OTFS) objectives simultaneously, giving flexibility to local decision makers. Aims. To extend existing research on the history of wildfire management, investigate how wildfire professionals interpret current policy with respect to OTFS management, and better understand how they…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Global rise in forest fire emissions linked to climate change in the extratropics
Year: 2024
Climate change increases fire-favorable weather in forests, but fire trends are also affected by multiple other controlling factors that are difficult to untangle. We use machine learning to systematically group forest ecoregions into 12 global forest pyromes, with each showing distinct sensitivities to climatic, human, and vegetation controls. This delineation revealed that rapidly increasing forest fire emissions in extratropical pyromes, linked to climate change, offset declining emissions in tropical pyromes during 2001 to 2023. Annual emissions tripled in one extratropical pyrome due to…
Publication Type: Journal Article
The Efficacy of Red Flag Warnings in Mitigating Human-Caused Wildfires across the Western United States
Year: 2024
Red flag warnings (RFWs) are issued by the U.S. National Weather Service to alert fire and emergency response agencies of weather conditions that are conducive to extreme wildfire growth. Distinct from most weather warnings that aim to reduce exposure to anticipated hazards, RFWs may also mitigate hazards by reducing the occurrence of new ignitions. We examined the efficacy of RFWs as a means of limiting human-caused wildfire ignitions. From 2006 to 2020, approximately 8% of wildfires across the western United States and 19% of large wildfires (≥40 ha) occurred on days with RFWs. Although the…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Quantifying wildland fire resources deployed during the compound threat of COVID-19
Year: 2024
Fire agencies across the United States must make complex resource allocation decisions to manage wildfires using a national network of shared firefighting resources. Firefighters play a critical role in suppressing fires and protecting vulnerable communities. However, they are exposed to health and safety risks associated with fire, smoke inhalation, and infectious disease transmission. The COVID-19 pandemic further complicated these risks, prompting fire agencies to propose resource management adaptations to minimize COVID-19 exposure and transmission. It is unclear if and how the pandemic…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Factors Associated with Concurrent Tobacco Smoking and Heavy Drinking within a Women Firefighters’ Sample
Year: 2024
Studies showed that tobacco use and excessive alcohol consumption frequently occur, and both are significant causes of preventable morbidity and mortality. Data were collected as part of a national online study of the health of women in the fire service. Multinomial logistic regression was employed to determine factors associated with smoking and drinking characteristics. A total of 2330 women firefighters completed questions regarding tobacco and alcohol use; 3.2% (n = 75) were concurrent users, 0.9% (n = 22) were smokers only, 49.4% (n = 1150) were heavy drinkers only, and 46.5% (n = 1083)…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Application of the wildland fire emissions inventory system to estimate fire emissions on forest lands of the United States
Year: 2024
BackgroundForests are significant terrestrial biomes for carbon storage, and annual carbon accumulation of forest biomass contributes offsets affecting net greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. The immediate loss of stored carbon through fire on forest lands reduces the annual offsets provided by forests. As such, the United States reporting includes annual estimates of direct fire emissions in conjunction with the overall forest stock and change estimates as a part of national greenhouse gas inventories within the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. Forest fire emissions…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Metals in Wildfire Suppressants
Year: 2024
Frequent and severe wildfires have led to increased application of fire suppression products (long-term fire retardants, water enhancers, and Class A foams) in the American West. While fire suppressing products used on wildfires must be approved by theU.S. Forest Service, portions of their formulations are trade secrets.Increased metals content in soils and surface waters at the wildland-urban interface has been observed after wildfires but has primarily been attributed to ash deposition or anthropogenic impact from nearby urban areas. In this study, metal concentrations in several fire…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Assessment of wildland firefighter opinions and experiences related to incident medical providers
Year: 2023
Background. Medical services for wildland fire incidents are vital and fire personnel need to be comfortable seeking care and have adequate access to care. Aims. The aim of this study was to examine wildland firefighters’ (WLFFs) attitudes towards, opinions of and experiences with the medical services on fire assignments. Methods. A survey was used to collect information from WLFFs. The survey covered: (1) demographics, (2) injury descriptions, (3) trust/respect toward medical personnel, and (4) perceived impact of injury treatment on individual and team deploy- ability. Analysis used…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Occupational and environmental factors influencing morale of United States federal wildland firefighters
Year: 2023
Background
Wildland firefighters have physically and psychologically demanding jobs that can result in social, economic and health-related stress. Previous studies have examined the physiological and physical effects of a career in wildland fire, but fewer studies have addressed psychological effects, and to date, none have directly analysed the hiring and work experiences of wildland firefighters.
Aims
We surveyed work experiences, health and well-being, and morale of wildland firefighters, explored factors that can improve recruitment and retention, and summarised broad patterns.…
Fuels and Fuel Treatments, Public Perceptions of Fire and Smoke, Social and Community Impacts of Fire
Publication Type: Journal Article
Detecting, Monitoring and Foreseeing Wildland Fire Requires Similar Multiscale Viewpoints as Meteorology and Climatology
Year: 2023
Achieving sustainable coexistence with wildfires in the Anthropocene requires skilful integrated fire observations, fire behaviour predictions, forecasts of fire risk, and projections of change to fire climates. The diverse and multiscale approaches used by the atmospheric sciences, to understand geographic patterns, temporal trends and likely trajectories of weather and climate, provide a role model for how multiscale assessments of fire danger can be formulated and delivered to fire managers, emergency responders and at-risk communities. Adaptation to escalating risk of fire disasters…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Landscape‑scale fuel treatment effectiveness: lessons learned from wildland fire case studies in forests of the western United States and Great Lakes region
Year: 2023
Background Maximizing the effectiveness of fuel treatments at landscape scales is a key research and management need given the inability to treat all areas at risk from wildfire. We synthesized information from case studies that documented the influence of fuel treatments on wildfire events. We used a systematic review to identify relevant case studies and extracted information through a series of targeted questions to summarize experiential knowledge of landscape fuel treatment effectiveness. Within a larger literature search, we identified 18 case study reports that included (1) manager…
Publication Type: Journal Article
How Does Fire Suppression Alter the Wildfire Regime? A Systematic Review
Year: 2023
Fire suppression has become a fundamental approach for shaping contemporary wildfire regimes. However, a growing body of research suggests that aggressive fire suppression can increase high-intensity wildfires, creating the wildfire paradox. Whether the strategy always triggers the paradox remains a topic of ongoing debate. The role of fire suppression in altering wildfire regimes in diverse socio-ecological systems and associated research designs demands a deeper understanding. To reconcile these controversies and synthesize the existing knowledge, a systematic review has been conducted to…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Use of the Wildland Fire Decision Support System (WFDSS) for full suppression and managed fires within the Southwestern Region of the US Forest Service
Year: 2023
Background: United States federal wildland fire policy requires the use of formal decision support systems (DSS) for fire incidents that last for an extended time. However, the ways that wildfire managers use DSSs in decisions regarding fire management remain understudied, including how users engage with or utilise them to make strategic decisions. Aims: Researchers sought to understand how users engage with the Wildland Fire Decision Support System (WFDSS), their view of its utilities and challenges, and their perspectives about WFDSS training. Methods: We present the results of thematic…
Publication Type: Journal Article