Decision support system for forest fire protection in the Euro-Mediterranean region

This paper describes the development of a decision support system (DSS) for prevention planning and emergency management of forest fire events that incorporates weather data management, a geographical data viewer, a priori danger forecasting and fire propagation modeling, automatic fire detection, and optimal resource dispatching. Collection, input, storage, management, and analysis of the information rely on advanced and automated methodologies using remote sensing, GPS, digital mapping, and geographic information systems. The results included short-term dynamic fire danger indices developed for improved and realistic prevention and pre-suppression planning. An automatic fire detection technology based on infrared video was developed and successfully tested on site. Several models for understanding fire propagation on forest fires have been proposed for practical application. Additionally, a DSS was developed with the innovation of covering wildland fire hazard management entirely, providing a complete coverage of technical and administrative activities that support decision makers in real time. The DSS was tested for high fire seasons in two different sites in South Europe.