Top Story--NASA Satellite, University of Maryland and U.S. Forest Service Provide Rapid Response to Wildfires

MODIS Land Rapid Response System

MODIS Rapid Response Fire Maps

For more information, contact:

David Steitz, Headquarters
Phone: 202/358-1730
David.Steitz@hq.nasa.gov

Lynn Chandler, Goddard Space
Flight Center
Phone: 301/286-2806
Lynn.Chandler.1@gsfc.nasa.gov

Lee Tune, University of Maryland
Phone: 301/405-4679
ltune@accmail.umd.edu

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August 20, 2001 (date of web publication)

NASA SATELLITE, UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND AND U.S. FOREST SERVICE PROVIDE RAPID RESPONSE TO WILDFIRES



	Image 1
	This true-color image over California was acquired by MODIS on August 13, 2001. The red box reveals the location and extent of the active wildfire in the region. Click on pic for a 1 km resolution picture.

U.S. firefighters and land managers are using the most modern NASA-satellite data to combat wildfires. NASA's Terra satellite provides a view of fires across all of the conterminous United States, which helps manage fires more effectively, both during and after wildfire events. The effort is a collaboration between NASA, the University of Maryland and the USDA Forest Service.

The Terra satellite beams daily images of western U.S. wildfires to NASA within a few hours of the time that it passes over the region. These images and active fire detections are transmitted to the U.S. Forest service (USFS). When the USFS' own direct broadcast receiving stations are completed in October this will reduce the transmission time to minutes. Images from Terra's Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) instrument will become a regular part of the Forest Service's fire monitoring toolkit.

In order to use MODIS data to tackle forest fires, a complex communications network must be maintained between NASA, the University of Maryland and the USDA Forest Service. The three institutions are all integrated under the Rapid Response Project. Rob Sohlberg at the University of Maryland's Department of Geography in College Park, Md. leads the Rapid Response Project with Jacques Descloitres at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. This program was created in response to a very bad fire season in 2000 including extensive wildfires in Idaho and Montana.



	Image 2
	This true-color image over Washington state was acquired by MODIS on August 18, 2001. The red boxes reveal the locations and extent of active wildfires across the region. Click on pic for a 1 km resolution image.

By the October of 2001, the Forest Service will have the capability to produce their own MODIS fire images within minutes of a Terra overpass. "The Active Fire Maps offer the potential for understanding the 'big picture' when working on resource allocations decisions," said Alice Forbes, Deputy Director for Forest Service Fire and Aviation Operations at the National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC). "The maps can also help the public understand where the fires are located, and give them a look at the burned areas after fire season."

The University and NASA have developed all of the needed software, which will be installed at the USFS direct broadcast station. The USFS has developed the corresponding software that creates the maps from the Terra data using standard USFS mapping techniques.

The USDA Forest Service Remote Sensing Applications Center (RSAC) in Salt Lake City, Utah, provides development, support, and application of remote sensing technologies and techniques. Currently, the Forest Service is building a MODIS processing center in Salt Lake City to generate real-time images of western wildfires. However, the Forest Service will still receive imagery of the eastern U.S. from the University and NASA.

Keith Lannom, the Operations Program Leader at RSAC, stated "the University of Maryland sends MODIS images and active fire location information daily to RSAC staff who are overlaying state boundaries and topographical features on the images to best determine where fires are occurring. These maps show current active fire areas in real-time on the Internet."

The maps show daily active fires, and areas that were burned during previous days. These maps will be used for strategic asset allocation when fighting wildfire. Advanced products to assist the Burned-Area Emergency Rehabilitation (BAER) teams are also being developed from Terra data. The BAER team consists of soil scientists, hydrologists, wildlife specialties and other scientists. They use burn severity maps - derived from satellite and ground measurements -- to take measures that will prevent further erosion, soil loss and adverse impacts to water quality. It is anticipated that Terra data will provide a quick look, which can then be refined on the ground. The maps will also help scientists identify critical wildlife habitat affected by the fire and facilitate reforesting an area.

Wei Min Hao, the Project Leader of the Fire Chemistry Project at the Forest Service's Fire Science Laboratory in Montana is developing a MODIS aerosol product to track smoke dispersed by wildfires, and to determine the impact that it has on regional air quality. Hao said, "During fires where there are large amounts of smoke, reconnaissance planes that normally map fires can't fly into an area, but MODIS can provide those pictures from space." Dr. Yoram Kaufman from NASA is working with Dr. Hao on these products.

The Terra spacecraft is part of NASA's Earth Science Enterprise, a long-term research effort being conducted to determine how human-induced and natural changes affect our global environment.