CLIMATE AND WILDFIRE IN THE WESTERN UNITED STATES

A 21-yr gridded monthly fire-starts and acres-burned dataset from U.S. Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management, National Park Service, and Bureau of Indian Affairs fire reports recreates the seasonality and interannual variability of wildfire in the western United States. Despite pervasive human i...

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Published inBulletin of the American Meteorological Society Vol. 84; no. 5; pp. 595 - 604
Main Authors Westerling, A. L., Gershunov, A., Brown, T. J., Cayan, D. R., Dettinger, M. D.
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Boston, MA American Meteorological Society 01.05.2003
Subjects
Analytical forecasting
Climate
Climate models
Climate variability
Climatic zones
Correlations
Earth, ocean, space
Exact sciences and technology
External geophysics
Fire history
Fires
Forest fires
Meteorology
Other topics in atmospheric geophysics
Seasons
Summer
Wildfire seasons
Wildfires
United States
North America
America
United States > US
Forecasting
Climate variation
Forest fire
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Summary:A 21-yr gridded monthly fire-starts and acres-burned dataset from U.S. Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management, National Park Service, and Bureau of Indian Affairs fire reports recreates the seasonality and interannual variability of wildfire in the western United States. Despite pervasive human influence in western fire regimes, it is striking how strongly these data reveal a fire season responding to variations in climate. Correlating anomalous wildfire frequency and extent with the Palmer Drought Severity Index illustrates the importance of prior and accumulated precipitation anomalies for future wildfire season severity. This link to antecedent seasons' moisture conditions varies widely with differences in predominant fuel type. Furthermore, these data demonstrate that the relationship between wildfire season severity and observed moisture anomalies from antecedent seasons is strong enough to forecast fire season severity at lead times of one season to a year in advance.
Bibliography:ObjectType-Article-2
SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1
ObjectType-Feature-1
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ISSN:0003-0007
1520-0477
DOI:10.1175/BAMS-84-5-595