Species Composition and Fire: Non-Additive Mixture Effects on Ground Fuel Flammability

PubMed Central

van Altena, Cassandra; van Logtestijn, Richard S. P.; Cornwell, William K.; Cornelissen, Johannes H. C.

2012-01-01

Diversity effects on many aspects of ecosystem function have been well documented. However, fire is an exception: fire experiments have mainly included single species, bulk litter, or vegetation, and, as such, the role of diversity as a determinant of flammability, a crucial aspect of ecosystem function, is poorly understood. This study is the first to experimentally test whether flammability characteristics of two-species mixtures are non-additive, i.e., differ from expected flammability based on the component species in monospecific fuel. In standardized fire experiments on ground fuels, including monospecific fuels and mixtures of five contrasting subarctic plant fuel types in a controlled laboratory environment, we measured flame speed, flame duration, and maximum temperature. Broadly half of the mixture combinations showed non-additive effects for these flammability indicators; these were mainly enhanced dominance effects for temporal dynamics – fire speed and duration. Fuel types with the more flammable value for a characteristic determined the rate of fire speed and duration of the whole mixture; in contrast, maximum temperature of the fire was determined by the biomass-weighted mean of the mixture. These results suggest that ecological invasions by highly flammable species may have effects on ground-fire dynamics well out of proportion to their biomass. PMID:22639656

Defining fire environment zones in the boreal forests of northeastern China.

PubMed

Wu, Zhiwei; He, Hong S; Yang, Jian; Liang, Yu

2015-06-15

Fire activity in boreal forests will substantially increase with prolonged growing seasons under a warming climate. This trend poses challenges to managing fires in boreal forest landscapes. A fire environment zone map offers a basis for evaluating these fire-related problems and designing more effective fire management plans to improve the allocation of management resources across a landscape. Toward that goal, we identified three fire environment zones across boreal forest landscapes in northeastern China using analytical methods to identify spatial clustering of the environmental variables of climate, vegetation, topography, and human activity. The three fire environment zones were found to be in strong agreement with the spatial distributions of the historical fire data (occurrence, size, and frequency) for 1966-2005. This paper discusses how the resulting fire environment zone map can be used to guide forest fire management and fire regime prediction. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Significance analysis of the regional differences on icing time of water onto fire protective clothing

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhao, L. Z.; Jing, L. S.; Zhang, X. Z.; Xia, J. J.; Chen, Y.; Chen, T.; Hu, C.; Bao, Z. M.; Fu, X. C.; Wang, R. J.; Wang, Y.; Wang, Y. J.

2017-09-01

The object of this work was to determine the icing temperature in icing experiment. Firstly, a questionnaire investigation was carried out on 38 fire detachments in different regions. These Statistical percentage results were divided into northern east group and northern west group. Secondly, a significance analysis between these two results was made using Mann-Whitney U test. Then the icing temperature was determined in different regions. Thirdly, the icing experiment was made in the environment of -20°C in Daxing’an Mountain. The anti-icing effect of new fire protective clothing was verified in this icing.

Determination of trace elements in dairy milk collected from the environment of coal-fired power plant.

PubMed

Ramamurthy, N; Thillaivelavan, K

2005-01-01

In the present study the environmental effects on herbivores mammals in and around Coal-fired power plant were studied by collecting the various milk samples of Cow and Buffalo in clean polyethylene bottles. Milk samples collected at five different locations along the banks of the Paravanaru river in and around Neyveli area. These samples were prepared for trace metal determination. The concentration of trace metals (Cu, Zn, Ni, Cd, Cr, Mn, Co and Hg) were determined by Inductively Coupled Plasma-Atomic Emission Spectrometry (ICP-AES) and Cold Vapour Atomic Absorption Spectrometry (CVAAS). It is observed that the samples contain greater amounts of trace metals than that in the unexposed areas. Obviously the milk samples are contaminated with these metals due to fly ash released in such environment.

Channel Response to Low-Elevation Desert Fire: The King Valley Fire of 2005

USGS Publications Warehouse

Webb, Robert H.; Griffiths, Peter G.; Wallace, Cynthia S.A.; Boyer, Diane E.

2007-01-01

In late September to early October 2005, a fire swept north from the Yuma Proving Grounds and into the Kofa National Wildlife Refuge (NWR), traveling mainly along desert wash systems and low-relief alluvial fans. This fire burned 9,975 ha, moving through xeroriparian systems in washes as well as low-elevation desert ecosystems in King Valley, a major area of designated wilderness in the southern part of the Kofa NWR. Using satellite imagery, we determined that 9,255 ha of the Kofa NWR in King Valley burned. The fine-fuel loading for the fire was mostly a native forb (Plantago insularis), and the desert environment that was burned was mostly low-cover creosote bush (Larrea tridentata) scrub with scattered palo verde (Cercidium microphyllum). The wash environments had significant tree cover, including ironwood (Olneya tesota), blue palo verde (Cercidium floridum), desert willow (Chilopsis linearis), and/or smoke tree (Psorothamnus spinosa). This report presents monitoring data collected in June 2006 and January-February 2007 on the effects of this fire on channel morphology in King Valley.

The boundary vector cell model of place cell firing and spatial memory

PubMed Central

Barry, Caswell; Lever, Colin; Hayman, Robin; Hartley, Tom; Burton, Stephen; O'Keefe, John; Jeffery, Kate; Burgess, Neil

2009-01-01

We review evidence for the boundary vector cell model of the environmental determinants of the firing of hippocampal place cells. Preliminary experimental results are presented concerning the effects of addition or removal of environmental boundaries on place cell firing and evidence that boundary vector cells may exist in the subiculum. We review and update computational simulations predicting the location of human search within a virtual environment of variable geometry, assuming that boundary vector cells provide one of the input representations of location used in mammalian spatial memory. Finally, we extend the model to include experience-dependent modification of connection strengths through a BCM-like learning rule, and compare the effects to experimental data on the firing of place cells under geometrical manipulations to their environment. The relationship between neurophysiological results in rats and spatial behaviour in humans is discussed. PMID:16703944

Predicting fire effects on water quality: a perspective and future needs

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Smith, Hugh; Sheridan, Gary; Nyman, Petter; Langhans, Christoph; Noske, Philip; Lane, Patrick

2017-04-01

Forest environments are a globally significant source of drinking water. Fire presents a credible threat to the supply of high quality water in many forested regions. The post-fire risk to water supplies depends on storm event characteristics, vegetation cover and fire-related changes in soil infiltration and erodibility modulated by landscape position. The resulting magnitude of runoff generation, erosion and constituent flux to streams and reservoirs determines the severity of water quality impacts in combination with the physical and chemical composition of the entrained material. Research to date suggests that most post-fire water quality impacts are due to large increases in the supply of particulates (fine-grained sediment and ash) and particle-associated chemical constituents. The largest water quality impacts result from high magnitude erosion events, including debris flow processes, which typically occur in response to short duration, high intensity storm events during the recovery period. Most research to date focuses on impacts on water quality after fire. However, information on potential water quality impacts is required prior to fire events for risk planning. Moreover, changes in climate and forest management (e.g. prescribed burning) that affect fire regimes may alter water quality risks. Therefore, prediction requires spatial-temporal representation of fire and rainfall regimes coupled with information on fire-related changes to soil hydrologic parameters. Recent work has applied such an approach by combining a fire spread model with historic fire weather data in a Monte Carlo simulation to quantify probabilities associated with fire and storm events generating debris flows and fine sediment influx to a reservoir located in Victoria, Australia. Prediction of fire effects on water quality would benefit from further research in several areas. First, more work on regional-scale stochastic modelling of intersecting fire and storm events with landscape zones of erosion vulnerability is required to support quantitative evaluation of water quality risk and the effect of future changes in climate and land management. Second, we underscore previous calls for characterisation of landscape-scale domains to support regionalisation of parameter sets derived from empirical studies. Recent examples include work identifying aridity as a control of hydro-geomorphic response to fire and the use of spectral-based indices to predict spatial heterogeneity in ash loadings. Third, information on post-fire erosion from colluvial or alluvial stores is needed to determine their significance as both sediment-contaminant sinks and sources. Such sediment stores may require explicit spatial representation in risk models for some environments and sediment tracing can be used to determine their relative importance as secondary sources. Fourth, increased dating of sediment archives could provide regional datasets of fire-related erosion event frequency. Presently, the lack of such data hinders evaluation of risk models linking fire and storm events to erosion and water quality impacts.

Simulated combined abnormal environment fire calculations for aviation impacts.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Brown, Alexander L.

2010-08-01

Aircraft impacts at flight speeds are relevant environments for aircraft safety studies. This type of environment pertains to normal environments such as wildlife impacts and rough landings, but also the abnormal environment that has more recently been evidenced in cases such as the Pentagon and World Trade Center events of September 11, 2001, and the FBI building impact in Austin. For more severe impacts, the environment is combined because it involves not just the structural mechanics, but also the release of the fuel and the subsequent fire. Impacts normally last on the order of milliseconds to seconds, whereas the firemore » dynamics may last for minutes to hours, or longer. This presents a serious challenge for physical models that employ discrete time stepping to model the dynamics with accuracy. Another challenge is that the capabilities to model the fire and structural impact are seldom found in a common simulation tool. Sandia National Labs maintains two codes under a common architecture that have been used to model the dynamics of aircraft impact and fire scenarios. Only recently have these codes been coupled directly to provide a fire prediction that is better informed on the basis of a detailed structural calculation. To enable this technology, several facilitating models are necessary, as is a methodology for determining and executing the transfer of information from the structural code to the fire code. A methodology has been developed and implemented. Previous test programs at the Sandia National Labs sled track provide unique data for the dynamic response of an aluminum tank of liquid water impacting a barricade at flight speeds. These data are used to validate the modeling effort, and suggest reasonable accuracy for the dispersion of a non-combustible fluid in an impact environment. The capability is also demonstrated with a notional impact of a fuel-filled container at flight speed. Both of these scenarios are used to evaluate numeric approximations, and help provide an understanding of the quantitative accuracy of the modeling methods.« less

Thermal biology of eastern box turtles in a longleaf pine system managed with prescribed fire.

PubMed

Roe, John H; Wild, Kristoffer H; Hall, Carlisha A

2017-10-01

Fire can influence the microclimate of forest habitats by removing understory vegetation and surface debris. Temperature is often higher in recently burned forests owing to increased light penetration through the open understory. Because physiological processes are sensitive to temperature in ectotherms, we expected fire-maintained forests to improve the suitability of the thermal environment for turtles, and for turtles to seasonally associate with the most thermally-optimal habitats. Using a laboratory thermal gradient, we determined the thermal preference range (T set ) of eastern box turtles, Terrapene carolina, to be 27-31°C. Physical models simulating the body temperatures experienced by turtles in the field revealed that surface environments in a fire-maintained longleaf pine forest were 3°C warmer than adjacent unburned mixed hardwood/pine forests, but the fire-maintained forest was never of superior thermal quality owing to wider T e fluctuations above T set and exposure to extreme and potentially lethal temperatures. Radiotracked turtles using fire-managed longleaf pine forests maintained shell temperatures (T s ) approximately 2°C above those at a nearby unburned forest, but we observed only moderate seasonal changes in habitat use which were inconsistent with thermoregulatory behavior. We conclude that turtles were not responding strongly to the thermal heterogeneity generated by fire in our system, and that other aspects of the environment are likely more important in shaping habitat associations. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Quantification Of Fire Signatures For Practical Spacecraft Materials

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

VanderWal, Randy L.; Ruff, Gary A.; Tomasek, Aaron J.

2003-01-01

The overall objective of this project is to measure the fire signatures of typical spacecraft materials in 1-g and determine how these signatures may be altered in a microgravity environment. During this project, we will also develop a test technique to obtain representative low-gravity signatures. The specific tasks that will be accomplished to achieve these objectives are to: (1) measure the time history of various fire signatures of typical spacecraft materials in 1-g at varying heating rates, temperatures, convective velocities, and oxygen concentrations, (2) conduct tests in the Zero-Gravity Facility at NASA John H. Glenn Research Center to investigate the manner that a microgravity environment alters the fire signature,(3) compare 0-g and 1-g time histories and determine if 0-g data exhibits the same dependence on the test parameters as experienced in 1-g (4) develop a 1-g test technique by which 0-g fire signatures can be measured. The proposed study seeks to investigate the differences in the identities and relative concentrations of the volatiles produced by pyrolyzing and/or smoldering materials between normal gravity and microgravity environments. Test materials will be representative of typical spacecraft materials and, where possible, will be tested in appropriate geometries. Wire insulation materials of Teflon, polyimide, silicone, and PVC will be evaluated using either cylindrical samples or actual wire insulation. Other materials such as polyurethane, polyimide, melamine, and silicone-based foams will be tested using cylindrical samples, in addition to fabric materials, such as Nomex. Electrical components, such as resistors, capacitors, circuit board will also be tested.

Introduction-2nd Fire Behavior and Fuels Conference: The fire environment-innovations, management, and policy

Treesearch

Wayne Cook; Bret W. Butler

2007-01-01

The 2nd Fire Behavior and Fuels Conference: Fire Environment -- Innovations, Management and Policy was held in Destin, FL, March 26-30, 2007. Following on the success of the 1st Fire Behavior and Fuels Conference, this conference was initiated in response to the needs of the National Wildfire Coordinating Group -- Fire Environment Working Team.

Validation experiments to determine radiation partitioning of heat flux to an object in a fully turbulent fire.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Ricks, Allen; Blanchat, Thomas K.; Jernigan, Dann A.

2006-06-01

It is necessary to improve understanding and develop validation data of the heat flux incident to an object located within the fire plume for the validation of SIERRA/ FUEGO/SYRINX fire and SIERRA/CALORE. One key aspect of the validation data sets is the determination of the relative contribution of the radiative and convective heat fluxes. To meet this objective, a cylindrical calorimeter with sufficient instrumentation to measure total and radiative heat flux had been designed and fabricated. This calorimeter will be tested both in the controlled radiative environment of the Penlight facility and in a fire environment in the FLAME/Radiant Heatmore » (FRH) facility. Validation experiments are specifically designed for direct comparison with the computational predictions. Making meaningful comparisons between the computational and experimental results requires careful characterization and control of the experimental features or parameters used as inputs into the computational model. Validation experiments must be designed to capture the essential physical phenomena, including all relevant initial and boundary conditions. A significant question of interest to modeling heat flux incident to an object in or near a fire is the contribution of the radiation and convection modes of heat transfer. The series of experiments documented in this test plan is designed to provide data on the radiation partitioning, defined as the fraction of the total heat flux that is due to radiation.« less

The Safety Analysis of Shipborne Ammunition in Fire Environment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ren, Junpeng; Wang, Xudong; Yue, Pengfei

2017-12-01

The safety of Ammunition has always been the focus of national military science and technology issues. And fire is one of the major safety threats to the ship’s ammunition storage environment, In this paper, Mk-82 shipborne aviation bomb has been taken as the study object, simulated the whole process of fire by using the FDS (Fire Detection System) software. According to the simulation results of FDS, ANSYS software was used to simulate the temperature field of Mk-82 carrier-based aviation bomb under fire environment, and the safety of aviation bomb in fire environment was analyzed. The result shows that the aviation bombs under the fire environment can occur the combustion or explosion after 70s constant cook-off, and it was a huge threat to the ship security.

Indirect Measures of Learning Transfer between Real and Virtual Environments

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Garrett, Michael; McMahon, Mark

2013-01-01

This paper reports on research undertaken to determine the effectiveness of a 3D simulation environment used to train mining personnel in emergency evacuation procedures, designated the Fires in Underground Mines Evacuation Simulator (FUMES). Owing to the operational constraints of the mining facility, methods for measuring learning transfer were…

Comparison of six fire severity classification methods using Montana and Washington wildland fires

Treesearch

Pamela G. Sikkink

2015-01-01

Fire severity classifications are used in the post-fire environment to describe fire effects, such as soil alteration or fuel consumption, on the forest floor. Most of the developed classifications are limited because they address very specific fire effects or post-burn characteristics in the burned environment. However, because fire effects vary so much among soil,...

Importance of charcoal in determining the age and chemistry of organic carbon in surface soils

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Krull, Evelyn S.; Swanston, Christopher W.; Skjemstad, Jan O.; McGowan, Janine A.

2006-12-01

Understanding the chemical character and turnover time of the oldest soil organic carbon (SOC) fraction is fundamental in deciphering soil carbon sequestration processes and the fate of soil-eroded carbon in aquatic sediments. Two main processes are thought to extend the turnover time of SOC: protection by the mineral matrix and chemical recalcitrance. Various oxidation methods have been proposed to isolate the oldest and most recalcitrant SOC fraction, which is often assumed to be black carbon (BC). However, few data have been published that confirm the chemical character of the isolated fractions. Using established and newly developed methods together with 13C-NMR spectroscopy and AMS dating, we show that protection by the mineral matrix prolonged the turnover time of SOC by tens of years, but long-term (hundreds of years) stabilization was controlled by the inherent recalcitrance of SOC, determined by the type of ecosystems. In ecosystem without significant fire occurrences, the older SOC pool was comparably small and was represented by alkyl carbon. In ecosystems with high fire frequency charcoal constituted the oldest SOC pool, and constituted up to 35% of the total SOC. By applying methods with different oxidative strengths, it was possible to isolate different age groups of charcoal with different degrees of weathering. Further substantiation of this finding could provide a much greater resolution of paleo-fire events. Our results demonstrate that fire frequency plays a dominant role in determining the chemical nature and 14C abundance of SOC and that the separation of age groups of charcoal provides a means to reconstruct detailed fire histories. Our results indicate that modeling SOC turnover, transport and sequestration for frequently burnt environments requires modification of existing models, specifying an input and decay function for the charcoal pool in different environments.

Born of fire - restoring sagebrush steppe

USGS Publications Warehouse

Pyke, David A.

2002-01-01

Fire is a natural feature of sagebrush grasslands in the Great Basin. The invasion of exotic annual grasses, such as Bromus tectorum (cheatgrass), has changed the environment in these ecosystems. Invasive annual grasses provide a dense and continuous source of fuel that extends the season for fires and increases the frequency of fires in the region. Frequent fires eventually eliminate the native sagebrush. These annual grasses also change soil nutrients, especially carbon and nitrogen, such that invasive annual grasses are favored over the native plants. The Forest and Rangeland Ecosystem Science Center of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) is studying how to reduce the problems caused by these invasive annual grasses and restore native sagebrush grasslands. The areas of research include understanding disturbance regimes, especially fire, discerning the role of nutrients in restoring native plants, determining the potential to restore forbs important for wildlife, and ascertaining the past and present use of native and nonnative plants in revegetation projects.

Canopy openness, understory light environments, and oak regeneration

Treesearch

Brian C. McCarthy; Scott A. Robison

2003-01-01

Understory light environments were evaluated in four mixed-oak forests in southern Ohio using hemispherical photography. Within each forest, plots were divided into nine treatment combinations based on three pretreatment fire categories and three Integrated Moisture Index (IMI) categories. For each of 108 photographs we determined the percentage of open sky, direct...

Index for characterizing post-fire soil environments in temperate coniferous forests

Treesearch

Theresa B. Jain; David S. Pilliod; Russell T. Graham; Leigh B. Lentile; Jonathan E. Sandquist

2012-01-01

Many scientists and managers have an interest in describing the environment following a fire to understand the effects on soil productivity, vegetation growth, and wildlife habitat, but little research has focused on the scientific rationale for classifying the post-fire environment. We developed an empirically-grounded soil post-fire index (PFI) based on available...

The fire environment--innovations, management, and policy; conference proceedings

Treesearch

Bret W. Butler; Wayne Cook

2007-01-01

The International Association of Wildland Fire sponsored the second Fire Behavior and Fuels conference in Destin, Florida. The conference theme was "Fire Environment--Innovations, Management, and Policy." Over 450 attendees participated in presentations on the latest innovations in wildland fire management, examples of successful and maybe not so successful...

Determinants of postfire recovery and succession in mediterranean-climate shrublands of California

USGS Publications Warehouse

Keeley, J.E.; Fotheringham, C.J.; Baer-Keeley, M.

2005-01-01

Evergreen chaparral and semideciduous sage scrub shrublands were studied for five years after fires in order to evaluate hypothesized determinants of postfire recovery and succession. Residual species present in the immediate postfire environment dominated early succession. By the fifth year postfire, roughly half of the species were colonizers not present in the first year, but they comprised only 7-14% cover. Successional changes were evaluated in the context of four hypotheses: (1) event-dependent, (2) fire interval, (3) self-regulatory, and (4) environmental filter hypotheses. Characteristics specific to the fire event, for example, fire severity and annual fluctuations in precipitation, were important determinants of patterns of change in cover and density, supporting the "event-dependent" hypothesis. The "fire interval" hypothesis is also supported, primarily through the impact of short intervals on reproductive failure in obligate seeding shrubs and the impact of long intervals on fuel accumulation and resultant fire severity. Successional changes in woody cover were correlated with decreases in herb cover, indicating support for "self-regulatory" effects. Across this landscape there were strong "environmental filter" effects that resulted in complex patterns of postfire recovery and succession between coastal and interior associations of both vegetation types. Of relevance to fire managers is the finding that postfire recovery patterns are substantially slower in the interior sage scrub formations, and thus require different management strategies than coastal formations. Also, in sage scrub (but not chaparral), prefire stand age is positively correlated with fire severity, and negatively correlated with postfire cover. Differential responses to fire severity suggest that landscapes with combinations of high and low severity may lead to enhanced biodiversity. Predicting postfire management needs is complicated by the fact that vegetation recovery is significantly controlled by patterns of precipitation. ?? 2005 by the Ecological Society of America.

Most Probable Fire Scenarios in Spacecraft and Extraterrestrial Habitats: Why NASA's Current Test 1 Might Not Always be Conservative

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Olson, S. L.

2004-01-01

NASA's current method of material screening determines fire resistance under conditions representing a worst-case for normal gravity flammability - the Upward Flame Propagation Test (Test 1). Its simple pass-fail criteria eliminates materials that burn for more than 12 inches from a standardized ignition source. In addition, if a material drips burning pieces that ignite a flammable fabric below, it fails. The applicability of Test 1 to fires in microgravity and extraterrestrial environments, however, is uncertain because the relationship between this buoyancy-dominated test and actual extraterrestrial fire hazards is not understood. There is compelling evidence that the Test 1 may not be the worst case for spacecraft fires, and we don t have enough information to assess if it is adequate at Lunar or Martian gravity levels.

Most Probable Fire Scenarios in Spacecraft and Extraterrestrial Habitats: Why NASA's Current Test 1 Might Not Always Be Conservative

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Olson, S. L.

2004-01-01

NASA s current method of material screening determines fire resistance under conditions representing a worst-case for normal gravity flammability - the Upward Flame Propagation Test (Test 1[1]). Its simple pass-fail criteria eliminates materials that burn for more than 12 inches from a standardized ignition source. In addition, if a material drips burning pieces that ignite a flammable fabric below, it fails. The applicability of Test 1 to fires in microgravity and extraterrestrial environments, however, is uncertain because the relationship between this buoyancy-dominated test and actual extraterrestrial fire hazards is not understood. There is compelling evidence that the Test 1 may not be the worst case for spacecraft fires, and we don t have enough information to assess if it is adequate at Lunar or Martian gravity levels.

Combustion Processes in the Aerospace Environment

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Huggett, Clayton

1969-01-01

The aerospace environment introduces new and enhanced fire hazards because the special atmosphere employed may increase the frequency and intensity of fires, because the confinement associated with aerospace systems adversely affects the dynamics of fire development and control, and because the hostile external environments limit fire control and rescue operations. Oxygen enriched atmospheres contribute to the fire hazard in aerospace systems by extending the list of combustible fuels, increasing the probability of ignition, and increasing the rates of fire spread and energy release. A system for classifying atmospheres according to the degree of fire hazard, based on the heat capacity of the atmosphere per mole of oxygen, is suggested. A brief exploration of the dynamics of chamber fires shows that such fires will exhibit an exponential growth rate and may grow to dangerous size in a very short time. Relatively small quantities of fuel and oxygen can produce a catastrophic fire in a closed chamber.

A generalized methodology to characterize composite materials for pyrolysis models

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

McKinnon, Mark B.

The predictive capabilities of computational fire models have improved in recent years such that models have become an integral part of many research efforts. Models improve the understanding of the fire risk of materials and may decrease the number of expensive experiments required to assess the fire hazard of a specific material or designed space. A critical component of a predictive fire model is the pyrolysis sub-model that provides a mathematical representation of the rate of gaseous fuel production from condensed phase fuels given a heat flux incident to the material surface. The modern, comprehensive pyrolysis sub-models that are common today require the definition of many model parameters to accurately represent the physical description of materials that are ubiquitous in the built environment. Coupled with the increase in the number of parameters required to accurately represent the pyrolysis of materials is the increasing prevalence in the built environment of engineered composite materials that have never been measured or modeled. The motivation behind this project is to develop a systematic, generalized methodology to determine the requisite parameters to generate pyrolysis models with predictive capabilities for layered composite materials that are common in industrial and commercial applications. This methodology has been applied to four common composites in this work that exhibit a range of material structures and component materials. The methodology utilizes a multi-scale experimental approach in which each test is designed to isolate and determine a specific subset of the parameters required to define a material in the model. Data collected in simultaneous thermogravimetry and differential scanning calorimetry experiments were analyzed to determine the reaction kinetics, thermodynamic properties, and energetics of decomposition for each component of the composite. Data collected in microscale combustion calorimetry experiments were analyzed to determine the heats of complete combustion of the volatiles produced in each reaction. Inverse analyses were conducted on sample temperature data collected in bench-scale tests to determine the thermal transport parameters of each component through degradation. Simulations of quasi-one-dimensional bench-scale gasification tests generated from the resultant models using the ThermaKin modeling environment were compared to experimental data to independently validate the models.

Management of fire affected areas. Beyond the environmental question

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pereira, Paulo

2016-04-01

Fire is considered a natural element of the ecosystems. With exception of the polar areas, fire visited with more or less frequency all the earth biomes, determining the ecosystems characteristics, to the point that several species are fire-dependent to survive and are very resilient to their impact. Fire was a fundamental element for human evolution, which allowed us to cook, manipulation of metals, hunt, protect from predators and clear fields for agriculture. In some extension, we are only humans because of fire. In the last millennium fire was used to shape the landscape as we know today. One good example of this is the Mediterranean environment, a landscape where the ecology is not understood without the presence of fire. Until the end of the first half of the last century, fire was used frequently by farmers to landscape management. However, due to rural abandonment, change of life styles, disconnection with rural environment and lack of understanding of fire role in the ecosystems. The perception of fire changed and nowadays is understood by the population as a threat to the ecosystems, rather than a tool that helped to manage the landscape and help us in our evolution. This change of vision promoted the idea that fire has negative impacts in the ecosystems and should be banned from the nature. Something that is impossible. All these perceptions facilitated the implementation of fire-suppression policies, which today are recognized by science as one of the causes of the occurrence of frequent high-severity wildfires, with important impacts on the ecosystems, economy and society. However, most of the ecosystems can regenerate sooner or later, depending of the fire severity and the ecosystem affected. Thus, fire is not an ecological, but social and economic problem, due to lives loss and the temporary destruction of ecosystems, which local communities depend on. In this context, when we are managing fire affected areas, it goes much beyond environmental questions, and our actions aim more to reduce the social and economic impacts of fire.

Fire detection system using random forest classification for image sequences of complex background

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kim, Onecue; Kang, Dong-Joong

2013-06-01

We present a fire alarm system based on image processing that detects fire accidents in various environments. To reduce false alarms that frequently appeared in earlier systems, we combined image features including color, motion, and blinking information. We specifically define the color conditions of fires in hue, saturation and value, and RGB color space. Fire features are represented as intensity variation, color mean and variance, motion, and image differences. Moreover, blinking fire features are modeled by using crossing patches. We propose an algorithm that classifies patches into fire or nonfire areas by using random forest supervised learning. We design an embedded surveillance device made with acrylonitrile butadiene styrene housing for stable fire detection in outdoor environments. The experimental results show that our algorithm works robustly in complex environments and is able to detect fires in real time.

Leachability of fired clay brick incorporating with sewage sludge waste

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kadir, Aeslina Abdul; Salim, Nurul Salhana Abdul; Sarani, Noor Amira; Rahmat, Nur Aqma Izurin; Abdullah, Mohd Mustafa Al Bakri

2017-09-01

Sewage sludge is sewerage from wastewater treatment plants that generates millions tons of sludge ever year. Regarding this activity, it causes lack management of waste which is harmful to the surrounding conditions. Therefore, this study is focuses on the incorporation of sewage sludge waste into fired clay brick to provide an option of disposal method, producing adequate quality of brick as well as limiting the heavy metal leachability to the environment. Sewage sludge brick (SSB) mixtures were incorporated with 0%, 1%, 5%, 10%, 20% and 30% of sewage sludge waste (SSW). Heavy metals of crushed SSB were determined by using Toxicity Characteristic Leaching Procedure (TCLP) according to Method 1311 of United State Environment Protection Agency (USEPA) standard. From the results obtained, up to 20% of SSW could be incorporated into fired clay brick and comply with the USEPA standard. Therefore, this study revealed that by incorporating SSW into fired clay brick it could be an alternative method to dispose the SSW and also could act as a replacement material for brick manufacturing with appropriate mix and design.

Fire Safety in Extraterrestrial Environments

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Friedman, Robert

1998-01-01

Despite rigorous fire-safety policies and practices, fire incidents are possible during lunar and Martian missions. Fire behavior and hence preventive and responsive safety actions in the missions are strongly influenced by the low-gravity environments in flight and on the planetary surfaces. This paper reviews the understanding and key issues of fire safety in the missions, stressing flame spread, fire detection, suppression, and combustion performance of propellants produced from Martian resources.

Is fire a long term sink or source of atmospheric carbon? A comprehensive evaluation of a boreal forest fire

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Santin, C.; Doerr, S. H.; Preston, C.; Bryant, R.

2012-12-01

Fires lead to a rapid release of carbon (C) from forest and other fire-prone ecosystems, emitting important quantities of C to the atmosphere. Every year 300-600 Mill. ha burn around the globe, generating CO2 emissions equivalent to half of the current annual global from fossil fuel combustion. Over the longer-term vegetation fires are widely considered as 'net zero Carbon (C) emission events', because C emissions from fires, excluding those associated with deforestation, are balanced by C uptake by regenerating vegetation. This 'zero C emission' scenario, however, may be flawed, as it does not consider the role of pyrogenic C (PyC). During fire, some of the fuel is transformed into PyC (i.e. charcoal, black C, soot), which is characterized by an enhanced recalcitrance and a longer mean residence time in the environment than its 'fresh' precursors. Therefore, after complete regeneration of the vegetation, the PyC generated represents an additional longer-term C pool and, hence, recurring fire-regrowth cycles could be considered as a 'net sink of atmospheric C'. To test the validity of this hypothesis, and to estimate how quantitatively important this PyC pool might be, accurate data on PyC production with respect to the fuel combusted are needed. Unfortunately, detailed quantification of fuel prior to fire is normally only available for prescribed and experimental fires, which are usually of low-intensity and therefore not representative of higher-intensity wildfires. Furthermore, what little data is available is usually based on only a specific fraction of the PyC present following burning rather than the whole range of PyC products and stores (i.e. PyC in soil, ash, downed wood and standing vegetation). The FireSmart project (Ft. Providence, NWT, Canada, June 2012) provided the ideal framework to address this research gap. This experimental fire reproduced wildfire conditions in boreal forest, i.e. stand-replacing crown fire and, at the same time, allowed i) pre-fire fuel assessment, ii) fire behaviour monitoring and iii) immediate post-fire fuel and PyC inventory. Before the fire, fuel characteristics were established and the site was instrumented with auto-logging thermocouples to provide temperature-duration profiles during burning. Also, different types of PyC were placed on the ground to determine PyC loss during the fire. Immediately after fire, the various post-burn PyC products and stores were sampled. Total PyC was quantified and the chemical recalcitrance of the different PyC forms found was determined. The results obtained will be discussed in the context of PyC production, and its different forms and quantities, with respect to (i) fire characteristics and fuel consumed, and (ii) the long term carbon balance in this boreal forest environment for recurring fire-regrowth cycles under current and predicted future climatic conditions.

Radionuclides in the soil around the largest coal-fired power plant in Serbia: radiological hazard, relationship with soil characteristics and spatial distribution.

PubMed

Ćujić, Mirjana; Dragović, Snežana; Đorđević, Milan; Dragović, Ranko; Gajić, Boško; Miljanić, Šćepan

2015-07-01

Primordial radionuclides, (238)U, (232)Th and (40)K were determined in soil samples collected at two depths (0-10 and 10-20 cm) in the vicinity of the largest coal-fired power plant in Serbia, and their spatial distribution was analysed using ordinary kriging. Mean values of activity concentrations for these depths were 50.7 Bq kg(-1) for (238)U, 48.7 Bq kg(-1) for (232)Th and 560 Bq kg(-1) for (40)K. Based on the measured activity concentrations, the radiological hazard due to naturally occurring radionuclides in soil was assessed. The value of the mean total absorbed dose rate was 76.3 nGy h(-1), which is higher than the world average. The annual effective dose due to these radionuclides ranged from 51.4 to 114.2 μSv. Applying cluster analysis, correlations between radionuclides and soil properties were determined. The distribution pattern of natural radionuclides in the environment surrounding the coal-fired power plant and their enrichment in soil at some sampling sites were in accordance with dispersion models of fly ash emissions. From the results obtained, it can be concluded that operation of the coal-fired power plant has no significant negative impact on the surrounding environment with regard to the content of natural radionuclides.

Development of a model to predict ash transport and water pollution risk in fire-affected environments

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Neris, Jonay; Elliot, William J.; Doerr, Stefan H.; Robichaud, Peter R.

2017-04-01

An estimated that 15% of the world's population lives in volcanic areas. Recent catastrophic erosion events following wildfires in volcanic terrain have highlighted the geomorphological instability of this soil type under disturbed conditions and steep slopes. Predicting the hydrological and erosional response of this soils in the post-fire period is the first step to design and develop adequate actions to minimize risks in the post-fire period. In this work we apply, for the first time, the Water Erosion Prediction Project model for predicting erosion and runoff events in fire-affected volcanic soils in Europe. Two areas affected by wildfires in 2015 were selected in Tenerife (Spain) representative of different fire behaviour (downhill surface fire with long residence time vs uphill crown fire with short residence time), severity (moderate soil burn severity vs light soil burn severity) and climatic conditions (average annual precipitation of 750 and 210 mm respectively). The actual erosion processes were monitored in the field using silt fences. Rainfall and rill simulations were conducted to determine hydrologic, interrill and rill erosion parameters. The soils were sampled and key properties used as model input, evaluated. During the first 18 months after the fire 7 storms produced runoff and erosion in the selected areas. Sediment delivery reached 5.4 and 2.5 Mg ha-1 respectively in the first rainfall event monitored after the fire, figures comparable to those reported for fire-affected areas of the western USA with similar climatic conditions but lower than those showed by wetter environments. The validation of the WEPP model using field data showed reasonable estimates of hillslope sediment delivery in the post-fire period and, therefore, it is suggested that this model can support land managers in volcanic areas in Europe in predicting post-fire hydrological and erosional risks and designing suitable mitigation treatments.

Fire training in a virtual-reality environment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Freund, Eckhard; Rossmann, Jurgen; Bucken, Arno

2005-03-01

Although fire is very common in our daily environment - as a source of energy at home or as a tool in industry - most people cannot estimate the danger of a conflagration. Therefore it is important to train people in combating fire. Beneath training with propane simulators or real fires and real extinguishers, fire training can be performed in virtual reality, which means a pollution-free and fast way of training. In this paper we describe how to enhance a virtual-reality environment with a real-time fire simulation and visualisation in order to establish a realistic emergency-training system. The presented approach supports extinguishing of the virtual fire including recordable performance data as needed in teletraining environments. We will show how to get realistic impressions of fire using advanced particle-simulation and how to use the advantages of particles to trigger states in a modified cellular automata used for the simulation of fire-behaviour. Using particle systems that interact with cellular automata it is possible to simulate a developing, spreading fire and its reaction on different extinguishing agents like water, CO2 or oxygen. The methods proposed in this paper have been implemented and successfully tested on Cosimir, a commercial robot-and VR-simulation-system.

Physical and Chemical Aspects of Fire Suppression in Extraterrestrial Environments

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Takahashi, F.; Linteris, G. T.; Katta, V. R.

2001-01-01

A fire, whether in a spacecraft or in occupied spaces on extraterrestrial bases, can lead to mission termination or loss of life. While the fire-safety record of US space missions has been excellent, the advent of longer duration missions to Mars, the moon, or aboard the International Space Station (ISS) increases the likelihood of fire events, with more limited mission termination options. The fire safety program of NASA's manned space flight program is based largely upon the principles of controlling the flammability of on-board materials and greatly eliminating sources of ignition. As a result, very little research has been conducted on fire suppression in the microgravity or reduced-gravity environment. The objectives of this study are: to obtain fundamental knowledge of physical and chemical processes of fire suppression, using gravity and oxygen concentration as independent variables to simulate various extraterrestrial environments, including spacecraft and surface bases in Mars and moon missions; to provide rigorous testing of analytical models, which include comprehensive descriptions of combustion and suppression chemistry; and to provide basic research results useful for technological advances in fire safety, including the development of new fire-extinguishing agents and approaches, in the microgravity environment associated with ISS and in the partial-gravity Martian and lunar environments.

Fire Protection of Large Air Force Hangars

DTIC Science & Technology

1975-10-01

Aqueous Film - Forming Foam ( AFFF ) in an environment...determining further the effectiveness of 3-percent aqueous film forming foam ( AFFF ); b) determining the effectiveness of AFFF systems at high ceiling...Id SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES 19. KEY WORDS fCont/nu» on reverse side If necessary and Identify by block number) Aqueous Film Forming Foam

Mapping burned areas and burn severity patterns across the Mediterranean region

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kalogeropoulos, Christos; Amatulli, Giuseppe; Kempeneers, Pieter; Sedano, Fernando; San Miguel-Ayanz, Jesus; Camia, Andrea

2010-05-01

The Mediterranean region is highly susceptible to wildfires. On average, about 60,000 fires take place in this region every year, burning on average half a million hectares of forests and natural vegetation. Wildfires cause environmental degradation and affect the lives of thousands of people in the region. In order to minimize the consequences of these catastrophic events, fire managers and national authorities need to have in their disposal accurate and updated spatial information concerning the size of the burned area as well as the burn severity patterns. Mapping burned areas and burn severity patterns is necessary to effectively support the decision-making process in what concerns strategic (long-term) planning with the definition of post-fire actions at European and national scales. Although a comprehensive archive of burnt areas exists at the European Forest Fire Information System, the analysis of the severity of the areas affected by forest fires in the region is not yet available. Fire severity is influenced by many variables, including fuel type, topography and meteorological conditions before and during the fire. The analysis of fire severity is essential to determine the socio-economic impact of forest fires, to assess fire impacts, and to determine the need of post-fire rehabilitation measures. Moreover, fire severity is linked to forest fire emissions and determines the rate of recovery of the vegetation after the fire. Satellite imagery can give important insights about the conditions of the live fuel moisture content and can be used to assess changes on vegetation structure and vitality after forest fires. Fire events occurred in Greece, Portugal and Spain during the fire season of 2009 were recorded and analyzed in a GIS environment. The Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), the Enhanced Vegetation Index (EVI) and the Normalized Burn Ratio (NBR) were calculated from 8-days composites MODIS/TERRA imagery from March to October 2009. In addition, subtracting a post-fire from a pre-fire image derived index produces a measure of absolute change of the vegetation condition, like the differenced Normalized Burn Ratio index (dNBR). The aim of this study was the assessment of fire severity across diverse ecological and environmental conditions in the Mediterranean region. The specific objectives were: • The analysis of the correlation between the fire severity and local site conditions, including topography, fuel type, land use, land cover. • The analysis of the correlation between fire severity and fire danger conditions during the fire, as estimated by the European Forest Fire Information System. • Assessing the performance of several vegetation indices derived from MODIS imagery in estimating fire severity. • Assessing the permanence of the burnt signal for large fires as an estimate of fire severity.

Plant Community and Soil Environment Response to Summer Fire in the Northern Great Plains

USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

Fire is a keystone process in many ecosystems, especially grasslands. However, documentation of plant community and soil environment responses to fire is limited for semiarid grasslands relative to that for mesic grasslands. Replicated summer fire research is lacking, but much needed because summe...

Influences of coupled fire-atmosphere interaction on wildfire behavior

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Linn, R.; Winterkamp, J.; Jonko, A. K.; Runde, I.; Canfield, J.; Parsons, R.; Sieg, C.

2017-12-01

Two-way interactions between fire and the environment affect fire behavior at scales ranging from buoyancy-induced mixing and turbulence to fire-scale circulations that retard or increase fire spread. Advances in computing have created new opportunities for the exploration of coupled fire-atmosphere behavior using numerical models that represent interactions between the dominant processes driving wildfire behavior, including convective and radiative heat transfer, aerodynamic drag and buoyant response of the atmosphere to heat released by the fire. Such models are not practical for operational, faster-than-real-time fire prediction due to their computational and data requirements. However, they are valuable tools for exploring influences of fire-atmosphere feedbacks on fire behavior as they explicitly simulate atmospheric motions surrounding fires from meter to kilometer scales. We use the coupled fire-atmosphere model FIRETEC to gain new insights into aspects of fire behavior that have been observed in the field and laboratory, to carry out sensitivity analysis that is impractical through observations and to pose new hypotheses that can be tested experimentally. Specifically, we use FIRETEC to study the following multi-scale coupled fire-atmosphere interactions: 1) 3D fire-atmosphere interaction that dictates multi-scale fire line dynamics; 2) influence of vegetation heterogeneity and variability in wind fields on predictability of fire spread; 3) fundamental impacts of topography on fire spread. These numerical studies support new conceptual models for the dominant roles of multi-scale fluid dynamics in determining fire spread, including the roles of crosswind fire line-intensity variations on heat transfer to unburned fuels and the role of fire line depth expansion in upslope acceleration of fires.

Failure analysis of storage tank component in LNG regasification unit using fault tree analysis method (FTA)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Mulyana, Cukup; Muhammad, Fajar; Saad, Aswad H.; Mariah, Riveli, Nowo

2017-03-01

Storage tank component is the most critical component in LNG regasification terminal. It has the risk of failure and accident which impacts to human health and environment. Risk assessment is conducted to detect and reduce the risk of failure in storage tank. The aim of this research is determining and calculating the probability of failure in regasification unit of LNG. In this case, the failure is caused by Boiling Liquid Expanding Vapor Explosion (BLEVE) and jet fire in LNG storage tank component. The failure probability can be determined by using Fault Tree Analysis (FTA). Besides that, the impact of heat radiation which is generated is calculated. Fault tree for BLEVE and jet fire on storage tank component has been determined and obtained with the value of failure probability for BLEVE of 5.63 × 10-19 and for jet fire of 9.57 × 10-3. The value of failure probability for jet fire is high enough and need to be reduced by customizing PID scheme of regasification LNG unit in pipeline number 1312 and unit 1. The value of failure probability after customization has been obtained of 4.22 × 10-6.

Fire Suppression and Response

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Ruff, Gary A.

2004-01-01

This report is concerned with the following topics regarding fire suppression:What is the relative effectiveness of candidate suppressants to extinguish a representative fire in reduced gravity, including high-O2 mole fraction, low -pressure environments? What are the relative advantages and disadvantages of physically acting and chemically-acting agents in spacecraft fire suppression? What are the O2 mole fraction and absolute pressure below which a fire cannot exist? What effect does gas-phase radiation play in the overall fire and post-fire environments? Are the candidate suppressants effective to extinguish fires on practical solid fuels? What is required to suppress non-flaming fires (smoldering and deep seated fires) in reduced gravity? How can idealized space experiment results be applied to a practical fire scenario? What is the optimal agent deployment strategy for space fire suppression?

Changes in Physical and Chemical Soil Properties on Burnt Shrub Areas in Mediterranean Mountains, Northern Portugal

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fonseca, Felícia; de Figueiredo, Tomás; Leite, Micaela

2014-05-01

Human induced fire in scrublands to obtain better pastures for cattle is a relatively common practice in North Portugal. During burning, plant cover and litter layers are consumed, and the mineral soil is heated, resulting in changes to physical, chemical, mineralogical, and biological soil properties. Aiming at evaluating the effect of this kind of fires on a set of physical and chemical soil properties, two study areas were selected in contrasting mountain environments: Edroso, Vinhais municipality, NE Portugal, with typical Mediterranean climate, and Revelhe, Fafe, NW Portugal, with a strong ocean-influenced climate. In both, sampling was carried out in contiguous areas burnt and not burnt, covered by shrub vegetation, predominantly Cytisus multiflorus and Ulex europeus. In each study area (Edroso and Revelhe) 16 locations were selected for soil sampling (8 in the burned area and 8 in the not burnt area), six months after fire occurrence. Disturbed soil samples were collected in the layers 0-5, 5-10, 10-15, 15-20 and 20-30 cm depth, for assessing organic matter, N, P and K concentration, cation exchange capacity and related determinations, soil pH, electrical conductivity and soil texture. Undisturbed samples were collected, in 100 cm3 cylinders, to determine bulk density in the same above mentioned layers, and permeability in the 0-5 cm layer. Compared results of burnt and not burnt areas in Edroso and Revelhe study sites, show that coarse elements content and permeability decreased and bulk density slightly increased with the fire effect. Chemical properties in both sites changed with after fire, as organic matter content, exchangeable Al and cation exchange capacity increased, the opposite trend being found for phosphorus, sum of exchangeable bases and electrical conductivity. Potassium, total nitrogen and exchangeable acidity showed different soil responses to fire in the two study areas. Results stress the clear effects of fire on fertility related soil properties, not only chemical but also physical, which is decisive for the post-fire recover of burnt shrub communities, in terms of vegetation and soil functions in these marginal mountain environments.

40 CFR Appendix E to Part 75 - Optional NOX Emissions Estimation Protocol for Gas-Fired Peaking Units and Oil-Fired Peaking Units

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 17 2013-07-01 2013-07-01 false Optional NOX Emissions Estimation Protocol for Gas-Fired Peaking Units and Oil-Fired Peaking Units E Appendix E to Part 75 Protection of Environment ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY (CONTINUED) AIR PROGRAMS (CONTINUED) CONTINUOUS EMISSION...

40 CFR Appendix E to Part 75 - Optional NOX Emissions Estimation Protocol for Gas-Fired Peaking Units and Oil-Fired Peaking Units

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 17 2014-07-01 2014-07-01 false Optional NOX Emissions Estimation Protocol for Gas-Fired Peaking Units and Oil-Fired Peaking Units E Appendix E to Part 75 Protection of Environment ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY (CONTINUED) AIR PROGRAMS (CONTINUED) CONTINUOUS EMISSION...

A tree-ring based fire history of riparian reserves in the Klamath Mountains.

Treesearch

Carl N. Skinner

2003-01-01

Surprisingly little fire history information is available for riparian environments despite their ecological importance. Thus, there is a great deal of uncertainty about the ecological role of fire in riparian environments. Considering the Mediterranean climate and the general pattern of frequent low-moderate severity fires in most vegetation types, it is logical to...

Potential climate change impacts on fire intensity and key wildfire suppression thresholds in Canada

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wotton, B. M.; Flannigan, M. D.; Marshall, G. A.

2017-09-01

Much research has been carried out on the potential impacts of climate change on forest fire activity in the boreal forest. Indeed, there is a general consensus that, while change will vary regionally across the vast extent of the boreal, in general the fire environment will become more conducive to fire. Land management agencies must consider ways to adapt to these new conditions. This paper examines the impact of that changed fire environment on overall wildfire suppression capability. We use multiple General Circulation Models and carbon emission pathways to generate future fire environment scenarios for Canada’s forested region. We then use these scenarios with the Canadian Forest Fire Behaviour Prediction System and spatial coverages of the current forest fuel composition across the landscape to examine potential variation in key fire behaviour outputs that influence whether fire management resources can effectively suppress fire. Specifically, we evaluate how the potential for crown fire occurrence and active growth of fires changes with the changing climate. We also examine future fire behaviour through the lens of operational fire intensity thresholds used to guide decisions about resources effectiveness. Results indicate that the proportion of days in fire seasons with the potential for unmanageable fire will increase across Canada’s forest, more than doubling in some regions in northern and eastern boreal forest.

Guide for Oxygen Compatibility Assessments on Oxygen Components and Systems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Rosales, Keisa R.; Shoffstall, Michael S.; Stoltzfus, Joel M.

2007-01-01

Understanding and preventing fire hazards is necessary when designing, maintaining, and operating oxygen systems. Ignition risks can be minimized by controlling heat sources and using materials that will not ignite or will not support burning in the end-use environment. Because certain materials are more susceptible to ignition in oxygen-enriched environments, a compatibility assessment should be performed before the component is introduced into an oxygen system. This document provides an overview of oxygen fire hazards and procedures that are consistent with the latest versions of American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM) Standards G63 (1999) and G94 (2005) to address fire hazards associated with oxygen systems. This document supersedes the previous edition, NASA Technical Memorandum 104823, Guide for Oxygen Hazards Analyses on Components and Systems (1996). The step-by-step oxygen compatibility assessment method described herein (see Section 4) enables oxygen-system designers, system engineers, and facility managers to determine areas of concern with respect to oxygen compatibility and, ultimately, prevent damage to a system or injury to personnel.

Stormwater and fire as sources of black carbon nanoparticles to Lake Tahoe.

PubMed

Bisiaux, Marion M; Edwards, Ross; Heyvaert, Alan C; Thomas, James M; Fitzgerald, Brian; Susfalk, Richard B; Schladow, S Geoffrey; Thaw, Melissa

2011-03-15

Emitted to the atmosphere through fire and fossil fuel combustion, refractory black carbon nanoparticles (rBC) impact human health, climate, and the carbon cycle. Eventually these particles enter aquatic environments, where they may affect the fate of other pollutants. While ubiquitous, the particles are still poorly characterized in freshwater systems. Here we present the results of a study determining rBC in waters of the Lake Tahoe watershed in the western United States from 2007 to 2009. The study period spanned a large fire within the Tahoe basin, seasonal snowmelt, and a number of storm events, which resulted in pulses of urban runoff into the lake with rBC concentrations up to 4 orders of magnitude higher than midlake concentrations. The results show that rBC pulses from both the fire and urban runoff were rapidly attenuated suggesting unexpected aggregation or degradation of the particles. We find that those processes prevent rBC concentrations from building up in the clear and oligotrophic Lake Tahoe. This rapid removal of rBC soon after entry into the lake has implications for the transport of rBC in the global aquatic environment and the flux of rBC from continents to the global ocean.

Star Clusters within FIRE

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Perez, Adrianna; Moreno, Jorge; Naiman, Jill; Ramirez-Ruiz, Enrico; Hopkins, Philip F.

2017-01-01

In this work, we analyze the environments surrounding star clusters of simulated merging galaxies. Our framework employs Feedback In Realistic Environments (FIRE) model (Hopkins et al., 2014). The FIRE project is a high resolution cosmological simulation that resolves star forming regions and incorporates stellar feedback in a physically realistic way. The project focuses on analyzing the properties of the star clusters formed in merging galaxies. The locations of these star clusters are identified with astrodendro.py, a publicly available dendrogram algorithm. Once star cluster properties are extracted, they will be used to create a sub-grid (smaller than the resolution scale of FIRE) of gas confinement in these clusters. Then, we can examine how the star clusters interact with these available gas reservoirs (either by accreting this mass or blowing it out via feedback), which will determine many properties of the cluster (star formation history, compact object accretion, etc). These simulations will further our understanding of star formation within stellar clusters during galaxy evolution. In the future, we aim to enhance sub-grid prescriptions for feedback specific to processes within star clusters; such as, interaction with stellar winds and gas accretion onto black holes and neutron stars.

Reconstructing grassland fire history using sedimentary charcoal: Considering count, size and shape.

PubMed

Leys, Berangere A; Commerford, Julie L; McLauchlan, Kendra K

2017-01-01

Fire is a key Earth system process, with 80% of annual fire activity taking place in grassland areas. However, past fire regimes in grassland systems have been difficult to quantify due to challenges in interpreting the charcoal signal in depositional environments. To improve reconstructions of grassland fire regimes, it is essential to assess two key traits: (1) charcoal count, and (2) charcoal shape. In this study, we quantified the number of charcoal pieces in 51 sediment samples of ponds in the Great Plains and tested its relevance as a proxy for the fire regime by examining 13 potential factors influencing charcoal count, including various fire regime components (e.g. the fire frequency, the area burned, and the fire season), vegetation cover and pollen assemblages, and climate variables. We also quantified the width to length (W:L) ratio of charcoal particles, to assess its utility as a proxy of fuel types in grassland environments by direct comparison with vegetation cover and pollen assemblages. Our first conclusion is that charcoal particles produced by grassland fires are smaller than those produced by forest fires. Thus, a mesh size of 120μm as used in forested environments is too large for grassland ecosystems. We recommend counting all charcoal particles over 60μm in grasslands and mixed grass-forest environments to increase the number of samples with useful data. Second, a W:L ratio of 0.5 or smaller appears to be an indicator for fuel types, when vegetation surrounding the site is before composed of at least 40% grassland vegetation. Third, the area burned within 1060m of the depositional environments explained both the count and the area of charcoal particles. Therefore, changes in charcoal count or charcoal area through time indicate a change in area burned. The fire regimes of grassland systems, including both human and climatic influences on fire behavior, can be characterized by long-term charcoal records.

Reconstructing grassland fire history using sedimentary charcoal: Considering count, size and shape

PubMed Central

Leys, Berangere A.; Commerford, Julie L.; McLauchlan, Kendra K.

2017-01-01

Fire is a key Earth system process, with 80% of annual fire activity taking place in grassland areas. However, past fire regimes in grassland systems have been difficult to quantify due to challenges in interpreting the charcoal signal in depositional environments. To improve reconstructions of grassland fire regimes, it is essential to assess two key traits: (1) charcoal count, and (2) charcoal shape. In this study, we quantified the number of charcoal pieces in 51 sediment samples of ponds in the Great Plains and tested its relevance as a proxy for the fire regime by examining 13 potential factors influencing charcoal count, including various fire regime components (e.g. the fire frequency, the area burned, and the fire season), vegetation cover and pollen assemblages, and climate variables. We also quantified the width to length (W:L) ratio of charcoal particles, to assess its utility as a proxy of fuel types in grassland environments by direct comparison with vegetation cover and pollen assemblages. Our first conclusion is that charcoal particles produced by grassland fires are smaller than those produced by forest fires. Thus, a mesh size of 120μm as used in forested environments is too large for grassland ecosystems. We recommend counting all charcoal particles over 60μm in grasslands and mixed grass-forest environments to increase the number of samples with useful data. Second, a W:L ratio of 0.5 or smaller appears to be an indicator for fuel types, when vegetation surrounding the site is before composed of at least 40% grassland vegetation. Third, the area burned within 1060m of the depositional environments explained both the count and the area of charcoal particles. Therefore, changes in charcoal count or charcoal area through time indicate a change in area burned. The fire regimes of grassland systems, including both human and climatic influences on fire behavior, can be characterized by long-term charcoal records. PMID:28448597

Index for characterizing post-fire soil environments in temperate coniferous forests

USGS Publications Warehouse

Jain, Theresa B.; Pilliod, David S.; Graham, Russell T.; Lentile, Leigh B.; Sandquist, Jonathan E.

2012-01-01

Many scientists and managers have an interest in describing the environment following a fire to understand the effects on soil productivity, vegetation growth, and wildlife habitat, but little research has focused on the scientific rationale for classifying the post-fire environment. We developed an empirically-grounded soil post-fire index (PFI) based on available science and ecological thresholds. Using over 50 literature sources, we identified a minimum of five broad categories of post-fire outcomes: (a) unburned, (b) abundant surface organic matter ( > 85% surface organic matter), (c) moderate amount of surface organic matter ( ≥ 40 through 85%), (d) small amounts of surface organic matter ( < 40%), and (e) absence of surface organic matter (no organic matter left). We then subdivided each broad category on the basis of post-fire mineral soil colors providing a more fine-tuned post-fire soil index. We related each PFI category to characteristics such as soil temperature and duration of heating during fire, and physical, chemical, and biological responses. Classifying or describing post-fire soil conditions consistently will improve interpretations of fire effects research and facilitate communication of potential responses or outcomes (e.g., erosion potential) from fires of varying severities.

Biogenic volatile organic compound emissions from vegetation fires.

PubMed

Ciccioli, Paolo; Centritto, Mauro; Loreto, Francesco

2014-08-01

The aim of this paper was to provide an overview of the current state of the art on research into the emission of biogenic volatile organic compounds (BVOCs) from vegetation fires. Significant amounts of VOCs are emitted from vegetation fires, including several reactive compounds, the majority belonging to the isoprenoid family, which rapidly disappear in the plume to yield pollutants such as secondary organic aerosol and ozone. This makes determination of fire-induced BVOC emission difficult, particularly in areas where the ratio between VOCs and anthropogenic NOx is favourable to the production of ozone, such as Mediterranean areas and highly anthropic temperate (and fire-prone) regions of the Earth. Fire emissions affecting relatively pristine areas, such as the Amazon and the African savannah, are representative of emissions of undisturbed plant communities. We also examined expected BVOC emissions at different stages of fire development and combustion, from drying to flaming, and from heatwaves coming into contact with unburned vegetation at the edge of fires. We conclude that forest fires may dramatically change emission factors and the profile of emitted BVOCs, thereby influencing the chemistry and physics of the atmosphere, the physiology of plants and the evolution of plant communities within the ecosystem. © 2014 The Authors. Plant, Cell & Environment published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

The influence of solid rocket motor retro-burns on the space debris environment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Stabroth, Sebastian; Homeister, Maren; Oswald, Michael; Wiedemann, Carsten; Klinkrad, Heiner; Vörsmann, Peter

The ESA space debris population model MASTER (Meteoroid and Space Debris Terrestrial Environment Reference) considers firings of solid rocket motors (SRM) as a debris source with the associated generation of slag and dust particles. The resulting slag and dust population is a major contribution to the sub-millimetre size debris environment in Earth orbit. The current model version, MASTER-2005, is based on the simulation of 1076 orbital SRM firings which contributed to the long-term debris environment. A comparison of the modelled flux with impact data from returned surfaces shows that the shape and quantity of the modelled SRM dust distribution matches that of recent Hubble Space Telescope (HST) solar array measurements very well. However, the absolute flux level for dust is under-predicted for some of the analysed Long Duration Exposure Facility (LDEF) surfaces. This points into the direction of some past SRM firings not included in the current event database. The most suitable candidates for these firings are the large number of SRM retro-burns of return capsules. Objects released by those firings have highly eccentric orbits with perigees in the lower regions of the atmosphere. Thus, they produce no long-term effect on the debris environment. However, a large number of those firings during the on-orbit time frame of LDEF might lead to an increase of the dust population for some of the LDEF surfaces. In this paper, the influence of SRM retro-burns on the short- and long-term debris environment is analysed. The existing firing database is updated with gathered information of some 800 Russian retro-firings. Each firing is simulated with the MASTER population generation module. The resulting population is compared against the existing background population of SRM slag and dust particles in terms of spatial density and flux predictions.

The Recovery of a Clinical Database Management System after Destruction by Fire *

PubMed Central

Covvey, H.D.; McAlister, N.H.; Greene, J.; Wigle, E.D.

1981-01-01

In August 1980 a fire in the Cardiovascular Unit at Toronto General Hospital severely damaged the physical plant and rendered all on-site equipment unrecoverable. Among the hardware items in the fire was the computer which supports our cardiovascular database system. Within hours after the fire it was determined that the computer was no longer serviceable. Beyond off-site back-up tapes, there was the possibility that recent records on the computer had suffered a similar fate. Immediate procedures were instituted to obtain a replacement computer system and to clean media to permit data recovery. Within 2 months a partial system was supporting all users, and all data was recovered and being used. The destructive potential of a fire is rarely seriously considered relative to computer equipment in our clinical environments. Full-replacement value insurance; an excellent equipment supplier with the capacity to respond to an emergency; backup and recovery procedures with off-site storage; and dedicated staff are key hedges against disaster.

Synoptic-scale and mesoscale environments conducive to forest fires during the October 2003 extreme fire event in Southern California

Treesearch

Chenjie Huang; Y.L. Lin; M.L. Kaplan; Joseph J.J. Charney

2009-01-01

This study has employed both observational data and numerical simulation results to diagnose the synoptic-scale and mesoscale environments conducive to forest fires during the October 2003 extreme fire event in southern California. A three-stage process is proposed to illustrate the coupling of the synoptic-scale forcing that is evident from the observations,...

Acute toxicity of three fire-retardant and two fire-suppressant foam formulations to the early life stages of rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss)

USGS Publications Warehouse

Gaikowski, Mark P.; Hamilton, Steven J.; Buhl, Kevin J.; McDonald, Susan F.; Summers, Cliff H.; Linder, G.; Krest, S.; Sparling, D.; Little, E.

1996-01-01

Laboratory studies were conducted with five early life stages of rainbow trout, Oncorhynchus mykiss, to determine the acute toxicities of five fire-fighting chemical formulations in standardized soft and hard water. Eyed egg, embryo–larvae, swim-up fry, and 60- and 90-d posthatch juveniles were exposed to three fire retardants (Fire-Trol LCG-R, Fire-Trol GTS-R, and Phos-Chek D75-F) and two fire-suppressant foams (Phos-Chek WD-881 and Silv-Ex). Swim-up fry were generally the most sensitive life stage, whereas the eyed-egg was the least sensitive. Toxicity of fire-fighting formulations was greater in hard water than in soft water for all life stages tested with Fire-Trol GTS-R and Silv-Ex and for 90-d-old juveniles tested with Fire-Trol LCG-R. The fire-suppressant foams were more toxic than the fire retardants. The 96-h median lethal concentrations (LC50s) were ranked from the most toxic to the least toxic formulation as follows (ranges are the lowest and highest 96-h LC50 calculated for each formulation): Phos-Chek WD-881 (11–44 mg/L), Silv-Ex (11–78 mg/L), Phos-Chek D75-F (218–>3,600 mg/L), Fire-Trol GTS-R (207–>6,000 mg/L), and Fire-Trol LCG-R (872–>10,000 mg/L). Toxicity values suggest that accidental entry of fire-fighting chemicals into aquatic environments could adversely affect fish populations.

The impact of wildland fires on calcareous Mediterranean pedosystems (Sardinia, Italy) - An integrated multiple approach.

PubMed

Capra, Gian Franco; Tidu, Simona; Lovreglio, Raffaella; Certini, Giacomo; Salis, Michele; Bacciu, Valentina; Ganga, Antonio; Filzmoser, Peter

2018-05-15

Sardinia (Italy), the second largest island of the Mediterranean Sea, is a fire-prone land. Most Sardinian environments over time were shaped by fire, but some of them are too intrinsically fragile to withstand the currently increasing fire frequency. Calcareous pedoenvironments represent a significant part of Mediterranean areas, and require important efforts to prevent long-lasting degradation from fire. The aim of this study was to assess through an integrated multiple approach the impact of a single and highly severe wildland fire on limestone-derived soils. For this purpose, we selected two recently burned sites, Sant'Antioco and Laconi. Soil was sampled from 80 points on a 100×100m grid - 40 in the burned area and 40 in unburned one - and analyzed for particle size fractions, pH, electrical conductivity, organic carbon, total N, total P, and water repellency (WR). Fire behavior (surface rate of spread (ROS), fireline intensity (FLI), flame length (FL)) was simulated by BehavePlus 5.0.5 software. Comparisons between burned and unburned areas were done through ANOVA as well as deterministic and stochastic interpolation techniques; multiple correlations among parameters were evaluated by principal factor analysis (PFA) and differences/similarities between areas by principal component analysis (PCA). In both sites, fires were characterized by high severity and determined significant changes to some soil properties. The PFA confirmed the key ecological role played by fire in both sites, with the variability of a four-modeled components mainly explained by fire parameters, although the induced changes on soils were mainly site-specific. The PCA revealed the presence of two main "driving factors": slope (in Sant'Antioco), which increased the magnitude of ROS and FLI; and soil properties (in Laconi), which mostly affected FL. In both sites, such factors played a direct role in differentiating fire behavior and sites, while they played an indirect role in determining some effects on soil. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Recovery of microbial community structure and functioning after wildfire in semi-arid environments: optimising methods for monitoring and assessment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Muñoz-Rojas, Miriam; Martini, Dylan; Erickson, Todd; Merritt, David; Dixon, Kingsley

2015-04-01

Introduction In semi-arid areas such as northern Western Australia, wildfires are a natural part of the environment and many ecosystems in these landscapes have evolved and developed a strong relationship with fire. Soil microbial communities play a crucial role in ecosystem processes by regulating the cycling of nutrients via decomposition, mineralization, and immobilization processes. Thus, the structure (e.g. soil microbial biomass) and functioning (e.g. soil microbial activity) of microbial communities, as well as their changes after ecosystem disturbance, can be useful indicators of soil quality and health recovery. In this research, we assess the impacts of fire on soil microbial communities and their recovery in a biodiverse semi-arid environment of Western Australia (Pilbara region). New methods for determining soil microbial respiration as an indicator of microbial activity and soil health are also tested. Methodology Soil samples were collected from 10 similar ecosystems in the Pilbara with analogous native vegetation, but differing levels of post-fire disturbance (i.e. 3 months, 1 year, 5, 7 and 14 years after wildfire). Soil microbial activity was measured with the Solvita test which determines soil microbial respiration rate based on the measurement of the CO2 burst of a dry soil after it is moistened. Soils were dried and re-wetted and a CO2 probe was inserted before incubation at constant conditions of 25°C during 24 h. Measurements were taken with a digital mini spectrometer. Microbial (bacteria and fungi) biomass and community composition were measured by phospholipid fatty acid analysis (PLFA). Results Immediately after the fire (i.e. 3 months), soil microbial activity and microbial biomass are similar to 14 years 'undisturbed' levels (53.18±3.68 ppm CO2-CO and 14.07±0.65 mg kg-1, respectively). However, after the first year post-fire, with larger plant productivity, microbial biomass and microbial activity increase rapidly, peaking after 5-7 years post fire (70.70±8.94 ppm CO2-CO and 21.67±2.62 mg kg-1, respectively). Microbial activity measured with the Solvita test was significantly correlated (R Pearson > 0.7; P < 0.001) with microbial parameters analysed with PLFA such as microbial biomass, bacteria biomass or mycorrhizhal fungi. This method has proven to be reliable, fast and easy to interpret for assessment of soil microbial activity in the recovery of soil quality during the recovery after fire. Keywords Pilbara region, biodiverse ecosystems, microbial biomass, microbial respiration, Solvita test, CO2 burst.

40 CFR Appendix D to Part 75 - Optional SO2 Emissions Data Protocol for Gas-Fired and Oil-Fired Units

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 17 2014-07-01 2014-07-01 false Optional SO2 Emissions Data Protocol for Gas-Fired and Oil-Fired Units D Appendix D to Part 75 Protection of Environment ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY (CONTINUED) AIR PROGRAMS (CONTINUED) CONTINUOUS EMISSION MONITORING Pt. 75, App. D Appendix D to Part 75—Optional SO2 Emissions Data...

Characterization of potential fire regimes: applying landscape ecology to fire management in Mexico

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Jardel, E.; Alvarado, E.; Perez-Salicrup, D.; Morfín-Rios, J.

2013-05-01

Knowledge and understanding of fire regimes is fundamental to design sound fire management practices. The high ecosystem diversity of Mexico offers a great challenge to characterize the fire regime variation at the landscape level. A conceptual model was developed considering the main factors controlling fire regimes: climate and vegetation cover. We classified landscape units combining bioclimatic zones from the Holdridge life-zone system and actual vegetation cover. Since bioclimatic conditions control primary productivity and biomass accumulation (potential fuel), each landscape unit was considered as a fuel bed with a particular fire intensity and behavior potential. Climate is also a determinant factor of post-fire recovery rates of fuel beds, and climate seasonality (length of the dry and wet seasons) influences fire probability (available fuel and ignition efficiency). These two factors influence potential fire frequency. Potential fire severity can be inferred from fire frequency, fire intensity and behavior, and vegetation composition and structure. Based in the conceptual model, an exhaustive literature review and expert opinion, we developed rules to assign a potential fire regime (PFR) defined by frequency, intensity and severity (i.e. fire regime) to each bioclimatic-vegetation landscape unit. Three groups and eight types of potential fire regimes were identified. In Group A are fire-prone ecosystems with frequent low severity surface fires in grasslands (PFR type I) or forests with long dry season (II) and infrequent high-severity fires in chaparral (III), wet temperate forests (IV, fire restricted by humidity), and dry temperate forests (V, fire restricted by fuel recovery rate). Group B includes fire-reluctant ecosystems with very infrequent or occasional mixed severity surface fires limited by moisture in tropical rain forests (VI) or fuel availability in seasonally dry tropical forests (VII). Group C and PFR VIII include fire-free environments that correspond to deserts. Application of PFR model to fire management is discussed.

33 CFR 155.4025 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-07-01

... another, when the vessel's own transfer equipment is not working. External firefighting teams means... vessel, or damage to the marine environment. Marine firefighting pre-fire plan means a plan that outlines... scene, at a safe distance from the vessel or on the vessel, who can determine the steps needed to...

SSME environment database development

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Reardon, John

1987-01-01

The internal environment of the Space Shuttle Main Engine (SSME) is being determined from hot firings of the prototype engines and from model tests using either air or water as the test fluid. The objectives are to develop a database system to facilitate management and analysis of test measurements and results, to enter available data into the the database, and to analyze available data to establish conventions and procedures to provide consistency in data normalization and configuration geometry references.

Soil heating during wildfires and prescribed burns: a global evaluation based on existing and new data

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Doerr, Stefan; Santin, Cristina; Reardon, James; Mataix-Solera, Jorge; Stoof, Cathelijne; Bryant, Rob; Miesel, Jessica; Badia, David

2017-04-01

Heat transfer from the combustion of ground fuels and soil organic matter during vegetation fires can cause substantial changes to the physical, chemical and biological characteristics of soils. Numerous studies have investigated the effects of wildfires and prescribed burns on soil properties based either on field samples or using laboratory experiments. Critical thresholds for changes in soil properties, however, have been determined largely based on laboratory heating experimentation. These experimental approaches have been criticized for being inadequate for reflecting the actual heating patterns soil experienced in vegetation fires, which remain poorly understood. To address this research gap, this study reviews existing and evaluates new field data on key soil heating parameters determined during wildfires and prescribed burns from a wide range of environments. The results highlight the high spatial and temporal variability in soil heating patters not only between, but also within fires. Most wildfires and prescribed burns are associated with heat pulses that are much shorter than those typically applied in laboratory studies, which can lead to erroneous conclusions when results from laboratory studies are used to predict fire impacts on soils in the field.

The Influence of Solid Rocket Motor Retro-Burns on the Space Debris Environment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Stabroth, S.; Homeister, M.; Oswald, M.; Wiedemann, C.; Klinkrad, H.; Vörsmann, P.

The ESA space debris population model MASTER Meteoroid and Space Debris Terrestrial Environment Reference considers firings of solid rocket motors SRM as a debris source with the associated generation of slag and dust particles The resulting slag and dust population is a major contribution to the sub-millimetre size debris environment in Earth orbit The current model version MASTER-2005 is based on the simulation of 1 076 orbital SRM firings which contributed to the long-term debris environment A comparison of the modelled flux with impact data from returned surfaces shows that the shape and quantity of the modelled SRM dust distribution matches that of recent Hubble Space Telescope HST solar array measurements very well However the absolute flux level for dust is under-predicted for some of the analysed Long Duration Exposure Facility LDEF surfaces This points into the direction of some past SRM firings not included in the current event database The most suitable candidates for these firings are the large number of SRM retro-burns of return capsules Objects released by those firings have highly eccentric orbits with perigees in the lower regions of the atmosphere Thus they produce no long-term effect on the debris environment However a large number of those firings during the on-orbit time frame of LDEF might lead to an increase of the dust population for some of the LDEF surfaces In this paper the influence of SRM retro-burns on the short- and long-term debris environment is analysed The existing firing database is updated with gathered

Vehicle fires and fire safety in tunnels

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2002-09-20

Tunnels present what is arguably the most hazardous environment, from the point of view of fire safety, that members of the public ever experience. The fire safety design of tunnels is carried out by tunnel engineers on the basis of a potential fire ...

Effect of Spacecraft Environmental Variables on the Flammability of Fire Resistant Fabrics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Osorio, A. F.; Fernandez-Pello, C.; Takahashi, S.; Rodriguez, J.; Urban, D. L.; Ruff, G.

2012-01-01

Fire resistant fabrics are used for firefighter, racecar drivers as well as astronaut suits. However, their fire resistant characteristics depend on the environment conditions and require study. Particularly important is the response of these fabrics to elevated oxygen concentration environments and radiant heat from a source such as an adjacent fire. In this work, experiments using two fire resistant fabrics were conducted to study the effect of oxygen concentration, external radiant flux and oxidizer flow velocity in concurrent flame spread. Results show that for a given fabric the minimum oxygen concentration for flame spread depends strongly on the magnitude of the external radiant flux. At increased oxygen concentrations the external radiant flux required for flame spread decreases. Oxidizer flow velocity influences the external radiant flux only when the convective heat flux from the flame has similar values to the external radiant flux. The results of this work provide further understanding of the flammability characteristics of fire resistant fabrics in environments similar to those of future spacecrafts.

Acute toxicity of fire-retardant and foam-suppressant chemicals to early life stages of chinook salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha)

USGS Publications Warehouse

Buhl, Kevin J.; Hamilton, Steven J.

1998-01-01

Laboratorys studies were conducted to determine the acute toxicity of three fire retardants (Fire-Trol GTS-R, Fire-Trol LCG-R, and Phos-Chek D75-F), and two fire-suppressant foams (Phos-Chek WD-881 and Ansul Silv-Ex) to early life stages of chinook salmon, Oncorhynchus tshawytscha, in hard and soft water. Regardless of water type, swim-up fry and juveniles (60 and 90 d posthatch) exhibited similar sensitivities to each chemical and these life stages were more sensitive than eyed eggs. Foam suppressants were more toxic to each life stage than the fire retardants in both water types. The descending rank order of toxicity for these chemicals tested with swim-up fry and juveniles (range of 96-h median lethal concentrations [LC50s]) was Phos-Chek WD-881 (7–13 mg/L) > Ansul Silv-Ex (11–22 mg/L) > Phos-Chek D75-F (218–305 mg/L) > Fire-Trol GTS-R (218–412 mg/L) > Fire-Trol LCG-R (685–1,195 mg/L). Water type had a minor effect on the toxicity of these chemicals. Comparison of acute toxicity values with recommended application concentrations indicates that accidental inputs of these chemicals into stream environments would require substantial dilution (237- to 1,429-fold) to reach concentrations equivalent to their 96-h LC50s.

Fire Ground Decision-Making: Transferring Virtual Knowledge to the Physical Environment

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Gillespie, Steven

2013-01-01

The primary purpose of this quantitative study was to examine if simulation training correlated with the decision-making abilities of firefighters from two departments (one in a mountain state and one in a southwest state). The other purposes were to determine if firefighter demographics were correlated with the completion of the simulation…

Comparison of crown fire modeling systems used in three fire management applications

Treesearch

Joe H. Scott

2006-01-01

The relative behavior of surface-crown fire spread rate modeling systems used in three fire management applications-CFIS (Crown Fire Initiation and Spread), FlamMap and NEXUS- is compared using fire environment characteristics derived from a dataset of destructively measured canopy fuel and associated stand characteristics. Although the surface-crown modeling systems...

Decision making under uncertainty: Recommendations for the Wildland Fire Decision Support System (WFDSS)

Treesearch

Matthew P. Thompson

2015-01-01

The management of wildfire is a dynamic, complex, and fundamentally uncertain enterprise. Fire managers face uncertainties regarding fire weather and subsequent influence on fire behavior, the effects of fire on socioeconomic and ecological resources, and the efficacy of alternative suppression actions on fire outcomes. In these types of difficult decision environments...

Atmospheric turbulence observations in the vicinity of surface fires in forested environments

Treesearch

Warren E. Heilman; Xindi Bian; Kenneth L. Clark; Nicholas S. Skowronski; John L. Hom; Michael R. Gallagher

2017-01-01

Ambient and fire-induced atmospheric turbulence in the vicinity of wildland fires can affect the behavior of those fires and the dispersion of smoke. The presence of forest overstory vegetation can further complicate the evolution of local turbulence regimes and their interaction with spreading fires and smoke plumes. Previous observational studies of wildland fire...

The use of satellite data for monitoring temporal and spatial patterns of fire: a comprehensive review

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lasaponara, R.

2009-04-01

Remotely sensed (RS) data can fruitfully support both research activities and operative monitoring of fire at different temporal and spatial scales with a synoptic view and cost effective technologies. "The contribution of remote sensing (RS) to forest fires may be grouped in three categories, according to the three phases of fire management: (i) risk estimation (before fire), (ii) detection (during fire) and (iii) assessment (after fire)" Chuvieco (2006). Relating each phase, wide research activities have been conducted over the years. (i) Risk estimation (before fire) has been mainly based on the use of RS data for (i) monitoring vegetation stress and assessing variations in vegetation moisture content, (ii) fuel type mapping, at different temporal and spatial scales from global, regional down to a local scale (using AVHRR, MODIS, TM, ASTER, Quickbird images and airborne hyperspectral and LIDAR data). Danger estimation has been mainly based on the use of AVHRR (onborad NOAA), MODIS (onboard TERRA and AQUA), VEGETATION (onboard SPOT) due to the technical characteristics (i.e. spectral, spatial and temporal resolution). Nevertheless microwave data have been also used for vegetation monitoring. (ii) Detection: identification of active fires, estimation of fire radiative energy and fire emission. AVHRR was one of the first satellite sensors used for setting up fire detection algorithms. The availbility of MODIS allowed us to obtain global fire products free downloaded from NASA web site. Sensors onboard geostationary satellite platforms, such as GOES, SEVIRI, have been used for fire detection, to obtain a high temporal resolution (at around 15 minutes) monitoring of active fires. (iii) Post fire damage assessment includes: burnt area mapping, fire emission, fire severity, vegetation recovery, fire resilience estimation, and, more recently, fire regime characterization. Chuvieco E. L. Giglio, C. Justice, 2008 Global charactrerization of fire activity: toward defining fire regimes from Earth observation data Global Change Biology vo. 14. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2486.2008.01585.x 1-15, Chuvieco E., P. Englefield, Alexander P. Trishchenko, Yi Luo Generation of long time series of burn area maps of the boreal forest from NOAA-AVHRR composite data. Remote Sensing of Environment, Volume 112, Issue 5, 15 May 2008, Pages 2381-2396 Chuvieco Emilio 2006, Remote Sensing of Forest Fires: Current limitations and future prospects in Observing Land from Space: Science, Customers and Technology, Advances in Global Change Research Vol. 4 pp 47-51 De Santis A., E. Chuvieco Burn severity estimation from remotely sensed data: Performance of simulation versus empirical models, Remote Sensing of Environment, Volume 108, Issue 4, 29 June 2007, Pages 422-435. De Santis A., E. Chuvieco, Patrick J. Vaughan, Short-term assessment of burn severity using the inversion of PROSPECT and GeoSail models, Remote Sensing of Environment, Volume 113, Issue 1, 15 January 2009, Pages 126-136 García M., E. Chuvieco, H. Nieto, I. Aguado Combining AVHRR and meteorological data for estimating live fuel moisture content Remote Sensing of Environment, Volume 112, Issue 9, 15 September 2008, Pages 3618-3627 Ichoku C., L. Giglio, M. J. Wooster, L. A. Remer Global characterization of biomass-burning patterns using satellite measurements of fire radiative energy. Remote Sensing of Environment, Volume 112, Issue 6, 16 June 2008, Pages 2950-2962. Lasaponara R. and Lanorte, On the capability of satellite VHR QuickBird data for fuel type characterization in fragmented landscape Ecological Modelling Volume 204, Issues 1-2, 24 May 2007, Pages 79-84 Lasaponara R., A. Lanorte, S. Pignatti,2006 Multiscale fuel type mapping in fragmented ecosystems: preliminary results from Hyperspectral MIVIS and Multispectral Landsat TM data, Int. J. Remote Sens., vol. 27 (3) pp. 587-593. Lasaponara R., V. Cuomo, M. F. Macchiato, and T. Simoniello, 2003 .A self-adaptive algorithm based on AVHRR multitemporal data analysis for small active fire detection.n International Journal of Remote Sensing, vol. 24, No 8, 1723-1749. Minchella A., F. Del Frate, F. Capogna, S. Anselmi, F. Manes Use of multitemporal SAR data for monitoring vegetation recovery of Mediterranean burned areas Remote Sensing of Environment, In Press Næsset E., T. Gobakken Estimation of above- and below-ground biomass across regions of the boreal forest zone using airborne laser Remote Sensing of Environment, Volume 112, Issue 6, 16 June 2008, Pages 3079-3090 Peterson S. H, Dar A. Roberts, Philip E. Dennison Mapping live fuel moisture with MODIS data: A multiple regression approach, Remote Sensing of Environment, Volume 112, Issue 12, 15 December 2008, Pages 4272-4284. Schroeder Wilfrid, Elaine Prins, Louis Giglio, Ivan Csiszar, Christopher Schmidt, Jeffrey Morisette, Douglas Morton Validation of GOES and MODIS active fire detection products using ASTER and ETM+ data Remote Sensing of Environment, Volume 112, Issue 5, 15 May 2008, Pages 2711-2726 Shi J., T. Jackson, J. Tao, J. Du, R. Bindlish, L. Lu, K.S. Chen Microwave vegetation indices for short vegetation covers from satellite passive microwave sensor AMSR-E Remote Sensing of Environment, Volume 112, Issue 12, 15 December 2008, Pages 4285-4300 Tansey, K., Grégoire, J-M., Defourny, P., Leigh, R., Pekel, J-F., van Bogaert, E. and Bartholomé, E., 2008 A New, Global, Multi-Annual (2000-2007) Burnt Area Product at 1 km Resolution and Daily Intervals Geophysical Research Letters, VOL. 35, L01401, doi:10.1029/2007GL031567, 2008. Telesca L. and Lasaponara R., 2006; "Pre-and Post- fire Behaviural trends revealed in satellite NDVI time series" Geophysical Research Letters,., 33, L14401, doi:10.1029/2006GL026630 Telesca L. and Lasaponara R 2005 Discriminating Dynamical Patterns in Burned and Unburned Vegetational Covers by Using SPOT-VGT NDVI Data. Geophysical Research Letters,, 32, L21401, doi:10.1029/2005GL024391. Telesca L. and Lasaponara R. Investigating fire-induced behavioural trends in vegetation covers , Communications in Nonlinear Science and Numerical Simulation, 13, 2018-2023, 2008 Telesca L., A. Lanorte and R. Lasaponara, 2007. Investigating dynamical trends in burned and unburned vegetation covers by using SPOT-VGT NDVI data. Journal of Geophysics and Engineering, Vol. 4, pp. 128-138, 2007 Telesca L., R. Lasaponara, and A. Lanorte, Intra-annual dynamical persistent mechanisms in Mediterranean ecosystems revealed SPOT-VEGETATION Time Series, Ecological Complexity, 5, 151-156, 2008 Verbesselt, J., Somers, B., Lhermitte, S., Jonckheere, I., van Aardt, J., and Coppin, P. (2007) Monitoring herbaceous fuel moisture content with SPOT VEGETATION time-series for fire risk prediction in savanna ecosystems. Remote Sensing of Environment 108: 357-368. Zhang X., S. Kondragunta Temporal and spatial variability in biomass burned areas across the USA derived from the GOES fire product Remote Sensing of Environment, Volume 112, Issue 6, 16 June 2008, Pages 2886-2897 Zhang X., Shobha Kondragunta Temporal and spatial variability in biomass burned areas across the USA derived from the GOES fire product Remote Sensing of Environment, Volume 112, Issue 6, 16 June 2008, Pages 2886-2897

Spatial probability models of fire in the desert grasslands of the southwestern USA

USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

Fire is an important driver of ecological processes in semiarid environments; however, the role of fire in desert grasslands of the Southwestern US is controversial and the regional fire distribution is largely unknown. We characterized the spatial distribution of fire in the desert grassland region...

Fire and the Environment: Ecological and Cultural Perspectives

Treesearch

Stephen C. Nodvin; Thomas A. Waldrop; [Editors

1991-01-01

Forty-one papers based on oral presentations are included under four categories: Fire Ecology; Fire Management; Cultural; and Fire History. In addition, three papers are presented from a special session on the 1988 fires in the Greater Yellowstone Area and fourteen papers are presented from a poster session.

Rheology of Foam Near the Order-Disorder Phase Transition

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Holt, R. Glynn; McDaniel, J. Gregory

1999-01-01

Foams are extremely important in a variety of industrial applications. Foams are widely used in fire-fighting applications, and are especially effective in fighting flammable liquid fires. In fact the Fire Suppression System aboard the Space Shuttle utilizes cylinders of Halon foam, which, when fired, force a rapidly expanding foam into the convoluted spaces behind instrument panels. Foams are critical in the process of enhanced oil recovery, due to their surface-active and highly viscous nature. They are also used as drilling fluids in underpressurized geologic formations. They are used as transport agents, and as trapping agents. They are also used as separation agents, where ore refinement is accomplished by froth flotation of the typically lighter and hydrophobic contaminants. The goal of the proposed investigation is the determination of the mechanical and rheological properties of foams, utilizing the microgravity environment to explore foam rheology for foams which cannot exist, or only exist for a short time, in 1g.

Firewalls in bee nests-survival value of propolis walls of wild Cape honeybee (Apis mellifera capensis).

PubMed

Tribe, Geoff; Tautz, Jürgen; Sternberg, Karin; Cullinan, Jenny

2017-04-01

The Cape bee is endemic to the winter rainfall region of South Africa where fires are an integral part of the ecology of the fynbos (heathland) vegetation. Of the 37 wild nests in pristine Peninsula Sandstone Fynbos in the Cape Point section of Table Mountain National Park that have been analyzed so far, only 22 could be accessed sufficiently to determine the existence of a propolis wall of which 68% had propolis walls which entirely enclosed their openings. The analysis of the 37 wild nests revealed that 78% occurred under boulders or in clefts within rocks, 11% in the ground, 8% in tree cavities, and 3% within shrubs. The analysis of 17 of these nests following a fire within the park revealed that the propolis walls materially protected the nests and retarded the fire with all the colonies surviving. The bees responded to the smoke by imbibing honey and retreating to the furthest recess of their nest cavity. The bees were required to utilize this honey for about 3 weeks after which fire-loving plants appeared and began flowering. Considerable resources were utilized in the construction of the propolis walls, which ranged in thickness from 1.5 to 40 mm (mean 5 mm). Its physical environment determines the nesting behavior of the Cape bee. The prolific use of propolis serves to insulate the nest from extremes of temperature and humidity, restricts entry, camouflages the nest, and acts as an effective fire barrier protecting nests established mostly under rocks in vegetation subjected to periodic fires.

Firewalls in bee nests—survival value of propolis walls of wild Cape honeybee ( Apis mellifera capensis)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tribe, Geoff; Tautz, Jürgen; Sternberg, Karin; Cullinan, Jenny

2017-04-01

The Cape bee is endemic to the winter rainfall region of South Africa where fires are an integral part of the ecology of the fynbos (heathland) vegetation. Of the 37 wild nests in pristine Peninsula Sandstone Fynbos in the Cape Point section of Table Mountain National Park that have been analyzed so far, only 22 could be accessed sufficiently to determine the existence of a propolis wall of which 68% had propolis walls which entirely enclosed their openings. The analysis of the 37 wild nests revealed that 78% occurred under boulders or in clefts within rocks, 11% in the ground, 8% in tree cavities, and 3% within shrubs. The analysis of 17 of these nests following a fire within the park revealed that the propolis walls materially protected the nests and retarded the fire with all the colonies surviving. The bees responded to the smoke by imbibing honey and retreating to the furthest recess of their nest cavity. The bees were required to utilize this honey for about 3 weeks after which fire-loving plants appeared and began flowering. Considerable resources were utilized in the construction of the propolis walls, which ranged in thickness from 1.5 to 40 mm (mean 5 mm). Its physical environment determines the nesting behavior of the Cape bee. The prolific use of propolis serves to insulate the nest from extremes of temperature and humidity, restricts entry, camouflages the nest, and acts as an effective fire barrier protecting nests established mostly under rocks in vegetation subjected to periodic fires.

Restoring fire to ecosystems: Methods vary with land management goals

Treesearch

Robert W. Mutch; Wayne A. Cook

1996-01-01

Periodic forest, grassland, and shrubland fires are part of the natural environment-as natural and vital as rain, snow, or wind (Heinselman 1978). Evidence of past fires is found in charcoal layers in lakes and bogs, and in the fire-scarred cross sections of trees. Recurring disturbances by fire are essential to the functioning of many ecosystems, termed "fire-...

BehavePlus fire modeling system, version 5.0: Design and Features

Treesearch

Faith Ann Heinsch; Patricia L. Andrews

2010-01-01

The BehavePlus fire modeling system is a computer program that is based on mathematical models that describe wildland fire behavior and effects and the fire environment. It is a flexible system that produces tables, graphs, and simple diagrams. It can be used for a host of fire management applications, including projecting the behavior of an ongoing fire, planning...

BehavePlus fire modeling system, version 4.0: User's Guide

Treesearch

Patricia L. Andrews; Collin D. Bevins; Robert C. Seli

2005-01-01

The BehavePlus fire modeling system is a program for personal computers that is a collection of mathematical models that describe fire and the fire environment. It is a flexible system that produces tables, graphs, and simple diagrams. It can be used for a multitude of fire management applications including projecting the behavior of an ongoing fire, planning...

[Considering the current state of fire safety in Taiwan's care environment from the perspective of the nation's worst recent hospital fire].

PubMed

Tseng, Wei-Wen; Shih, Chung-Liang; Chien, Shen-Wen

2013-04-01

Taiwan's worst hospital fire in history on October 23rd, 2012 at Sinying Hospital's Bei-Men Branch resulted in 13 elderly patient deaths and over 70 injuries. The heavy casualties were due in part to the serious condition of patients. Some patients on life-support machines were unable to move or be moved. This disaster highlights the issue of fire safety in small-scale hospitals that have transformed existing hospital space into special care environments for elderly patients. Compared with medical centers and general hospitals, these small-scale health facilities are ill equipped to deal properly with fire safety management and emergency response issues due to inadequate fire protection facilities, fire safety equipment, and human resources. Small-scale facilities that offer health care and medical services to mostly immobile patients face fire risks that differ significantly from general health care facilities. This paper focuses on fire risks in small-scale facilities and suggests a strategy for fire prevention and emergency response procedures, including countermeasures for fire risk assessment, management, and emergency response, in order to improve fire safety at these institutions in Taiwan.

Using satellite fire detection to calibrate components of the fire weather index system in Malaysia and Indonesia.

PubMed

Dymond, Caren C; Field, Robert D; Roswintiarti, Orbita; Guswanto

2005-04-01

Vegetation fires have become an increasing problem in tropical environments as a consequence of socioeconomic pressures and subsequent land-use change. In response, fire management systems are being developed. This study set out to determine the relationships between two aspects of the fire problems in western Indonesia and Malaysia, and two components of the Canadian Forest Fire Weather Index System. The study resulted in a new method for calibrating components of fire danger rating systems based on satellite fire detection (hotspot) data. Once the climate was accounted for, a problematic number of fires were related to high levels of the Fine Fuel Moisture Code. The relationship between climate, Fine Fuel Moisture Code, and hotspot occurrence was used to calibrate Fire Occurrence Potential classes where low accounted for 3% of the fires from 1994 to 2000, moderate accounted for 25%, high 26%, and extreme 38%. Further problems arise when there are large clusters of fires burning that may consume valuable land or produce local smoke pollution. Once the climate was taken into account, the hotspot load (number and size of clusters of hotspots) was related to the Fire Weather Index. The relationship between climate, Fire Weather Index, and hotspot load was used to calibrate Fire Load Potential classes. Low Fire Load Potential conditions (75% of an average year) corresponded with 24% of the hotspot clusters, which had an average size of 30% of the largest cluster. In contrast, extreme Fire Load Potential conditions (1% of an average year) corresponded with 30% of the hotspot clusters, which had an average size of 58% of the maximum. Both Fire Occurrence Potential and Fire Load Potential calibrations were successfully validated with data from 2001. This study showed that when ground measurements are not available, fire statistics derived from satellite fire detection archives can be reliably used for calibration. More importantly, as a result of this work, Malaysia and Indonesia have two new sources of information to initiate fire prevention and suppression activities.

Vibration effects of the space shuttle main engine high pressure oxidizer turbopump bellows

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Harp, J. A.

1978-01-01

A welded metal bellows was subjected to a series of vibration tests in a 400 psi oxygen environment to evaluate the effects of the bellows convolutes rubbing on the damper ring in the high pressure oxidizer turbopump of the space shuttle main engine. The bellows was subjected to approximately 2 million cycles at 0.007 in. double amplitude displacement during this series of tests, at a frequency of 400 Hz. Intrumentation of the test specimen revealed no significant heat buildup caused by the rubbing of the bellows convolutes on the damper ring. A final destruct test was made to determine if a fire would result if the bellows ruptured in the 400 psi oxygen environment, thus exposing a fresh metal surface. The vibration input was changed to 0.8 in. double amplitude displacement at 20 Hz to intentionally rupture the bellows. Failure occurred after 2.5 sec; no fire or heat buildup was encountered.

Sociogenomics of cooperation and conflict during colony foundation in the fire ant Solenopsis invicta

USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

The genomic state of an individual results from the interplay between its internal condition and the external environment, which may include the social environment. The link between genes and social environment is clearly visible during the process of colony founding in the fire ant Solenopsis invic...

Fire occurence (2004)

Treesearch

John W. Coulston

2007-01-01

Why Is Fire Important? Fire is a powerful, selective regulatory mechanism in forest ecosystems. It is a natural part of the environment, and fireaffected ecosystems depend on a particular frequency and intensity of fire. These ecosystems will remain in their natural state only if the fire regime to which they are adapted is present (Kimmins 1987). The frequency and...

40 CFR 61.43 - Emission testing-rocket firing or propellant disposal.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 9 2014-07-01 2014-07-01 false Emission testing-rocket firing or... Standard for Beryllium Rocket Motor Firing § 61.43 Emission testing—rocket firing or propellant disposal. (a) Ambient air concentrations shall be measured during and after firing of a rocket motor or...

40 CFR 61.43 - Emission testing-rocket firing or propellant disposal.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 9 2013-07-01 2013-07-01 false Emission testing-rocket firing or... Standard for Beryllium Rocket Motor Firing § 61.43 Emission testing—rocket firing or propellant disposal. (a) Ambient air concentrations shall be measured during and after firing of a rocket motor or...

40 CFR 61.43 - Emission testing-rocket firing or propellant disposal.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 8 2011-07-01 2011-07-01 false Emission testing-rocket firing or... Standard for Beryllium Rocket Motor Firing § 61.43 Emission testing—rocket firing or propellant disposal. (a) Ambient air concentrations shall be measured during and after firing of a rocket motor or...

40 CFR 61.43 - Emission testing-rocket firing or propellant disposal.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 9 2012-07-01 2012-07-01 false Emission testing-rocket firing or... Standard for Beryllium Rocket Motor Firing § 61.43 Emission testing—rocket firing or propellant disposal. (a) Ambient air concentrations shall be measured during and after firing of a rocket motor or...

40 CFR 61.43 - Emission testing-rocket firing or propellant disposal.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 8 2010-07-01 2010-07-01 false Emission testing-rocket firing or... Standard for Beryllium Rocket Motor Firing § 61.43 Emission testing—rocket firing or propellant disposal. (a) Ambient air concentrations shall be measured during and after firing of a rocket motor or...

Developing Standards to Qualify a Fine Water Mist Fire Extinguisher for Human Spaceflight

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Graf, John

2011-01-01

NASA is developing a Fine Water Mist Portable Fire Extinguisher for use on the International Space Station. The International Space Station presently uses two different types of fire extinguishers: a water foam extinguisher in the Russian Segment, and a carbon dioxide extinguisher in the US Segment and Columbus and Kibo pressurized elements. Changes in emergency breathing equipment make Fine Water Mist operationally preferable. Supplied oxygen breathing systems allow for safe discharge of a carbon dioxide fire extinguisher, without concerns of the crew inhaling unsafe levels of carbon dioxide. But the Portable Breathing Apparatus offers no more than 15 minutes of capability, and continued use of hose based supplied oxygen systems increases the oxygen content in a fire situation. NASA has developed a filtering respirator cartridge for use in a fire environment. It is qualified to provide up to 90 minutes of capability, and because it is a filtering respirator it does not add oxygen to the environment. The fire response respirator cartridge does not filter carbon dioxide, so a crew member discharging a CO2 fire extinguisher while wearing this filtering respirator would be at risk of inhaling unsafe levels of CO2. Fine Water Mist extinguishes a fire without creating a large volume of air with reduced oxygen and elevated CO2. Compared to the carbon dioxide based Portable Fire Extinguisher, the flight qualification of Fine Water Mist systems requires special care. Qualification of the CO2 based Portable Fire Extinguisher began with the assumption that any fire on ISS would be extinguished if the air in the fire environment reached a critical concentration of CO2. Qualification of a CO2 based system requires the developers to make assertions and assumptions about vehicle geometry and the ability of the extinguisher to deliver CO2 in different geometric configurations, but the developers did not need to make assertions or assumptions about the size of the fire, the temperature, or the heat generation rate. Fine Water Mist systems extinguish a fire predominantly by removing heat -- so qualification standards must evaluate geometry, but also temperature, heat transfer, and heat generation rate. This paper outlines and describes the methods used to develop standards used to qualify Fine Water Mist systems for a human spaceflight environment.

The distribution, abundance, and the effects of fire on mound building termites (Trinervitermes and Cubitermes spp., Isoptera: Termitidae) in northern guinea savanna West Africa.

PubMed

Benzie, John A H

1986-11-01

Termite mound densities in typical guinea savanna, Detarium, and grassland (boval) habitats in northern guinea savanna were determined by random quadratting of 2-3 sites in each habitat (100, 10x10 m quadrats per habitat). Dominant species in guinea savanna were T. geminatus (46 mounds ha -1 ) and T. oeconomus (21 mounds ha -1 ), in Detarium T. geminatus (59 mounds ha -1 ) and C. curtatus (45 mounds ha -1 ) and in boval C. curtatus (72 mounds ha -1 ) and T. geminatus (22 mounds ha -1 ). Only C. curtatus densities and total densities differed significantly between sites within habitats, but all species differed significantly in abundance between habitats. The composition of each community was related to general environment but no particular environmental variable was shown to be a major determinant of termite distribution. Evidence for the limitation of termite populations was obtained from indirect evidence of competition between colonies in Detarium, and by experimental manipulation of fire regimes in the typical guinea savanna habitat. Harvester termites increased four-five fold over two years in fire-protected plots as a result of increased food supplies. Total termite densities in the fire-protected community equilibrated to the new population density (100 mounds ha -1 ) after only two-three years.

Isolated Liquid Droplet Combustion: Inhibition and Extinction Studies

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Dryer, F. L.; Kroenlein, K. G.; Kazakov, A.; Williams, F. A.; Nayagam, V.

2004-01-01

Introduction of fire suppressants to the ambient environment surrounding a heterogeneous diffusion flame may be an inefficient technique for fire safety in systems without buoyant flows. Carbon dioxide substitution for nitrogen diluent leads to significant modifications of the sphero-symmetric burning behavior of isolated n-heptane droplets, partly through increased heat capacity within the gaseous diffusion flame, but mostly because of modifications in spectral radiative coupling in the gas phase. Effects of longer time scale phenomena such as sooting and slow gas-phase/droplet convection remain to be determined. Similar methodologies can be applied to evaluate the effects and efficacy of chemical inhibitors in the liquid and gas phases.

The formation of fire residues associated with hunter-gatherers in humid tropical environments: A geo-ethnoarchaeological perspective

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Friesem, David E.; Lavi, Noa; Madella, Marco; Boaretto, Elisabetta; Ajithparsad, P.; French, Charles

2017-09-01

Tropical forests have been an important human habitat and played a significant role in early human dispersal and evolution. Likewise, the use of fire, besides being one of the exceptional characteristics of humans, serves as a marker for human evolution. While the use of fire by prehistoric hunter-gatherers is relatively well documented in arid and temperate environments, the archaeological evidence in humid tropical environment is to date very limited. We first review the archaeological evidence for hunter-gatherer use of fire in humid tropical environments and suggest that better understanding of formation processes is required. We present a geo-ethnoarchaeological study from South India, involving ethnography, excavations and laboratory-based analyses in order to build a new framework to study fire residues in humid tropical forests associated with hunter-gatherer's use of fire. Ethnographic observations point to a dynamic and ephemeral use of hearths. Hearths location were dictated by the social and ever-changing social dynamics of the site. The hearths deposited small amount of residues which were later swept on a daily basis, re-depositing ash and charcoal in waste areas and leaving only a microscopic signal in the original location. Particular acidic conditions and intensive biological activity within tropical sediments result in the complete dissolution of ash and bones while favouring the preservation of charcoal and phytoliths. Consequently, the identification of fire residues in humid tropical forests and the reconstruction of the human use of fire must involve multi-proxy microscopic analysis to detect its micro-signatures.

Simulation and thermal imaging of the 2006 Esperanza Wildfire in southern California: application of a coupled weather-wildland fire model

Treesearch

Janice L. Coen; Philip J Riggan

2014-01-01

The 2006 Esperanza Fire in Riverside County, California, was simulated with the Coupled Atmosphere-Wildland Fire Environment (CAWFE) model to examine how dynamic interactions of the atmosphere with large-scale fire spread and energy release may affect observed patterns of fire behavior as mapped using the FireMapper thermal imaging radiometer. CAWFE simulated the...

Effects of prescribed fires on soil properties: A review.

PubMed

Alcañiz, M; Outeiro, L; Francos, M; Úbeda, X

2018-02-01

Soils constitute one of the most valuable resources on earth, especially because soil is renewable on human time scales. During the 20th century, a period marked by a widespread rural exodus and land abandonment, fire suppression policies were adopted facilitating the accumulation of fuel in forested areas, exacerbating the effects of wildfires, leading to severe degradation of soils. Prescribed fires emerged as an option for protecting forests and their soils from wildfires through the reduction of fuels levels. However such fires can serve other objectives, including stimulating the regeneration of a particular plant species, maintaining biological diversity or as a tool for recovering grasslands in encroached lands. This paper reviews studies examining the short- and long- term impacts of prescribed fires on the physical, chemical and biological soil properties; in so doing, it provides a summary of the benefits and drawbacks of this technique, to help determine if prescribed fires can be useful for managing the landscape. From the study conducted, we can affirm that prescribed fires affects soil properties but differ greatly depending on soil initial characteristics, vegetation or type of fire. Also, it is possible to see that soil's physical and biological properties are more strongly affected by prescribed fires than are its chemical properties. Finally, we conclude that prescribed fires clearly constitute a disturbance on the environment (positive, neutral or negative depending on the soil property studied), but most of the studies reviewed report a good recovery and their effects could be less pronounced than those of wildfires because of the limited soil heating and lower fire intensity and severity. Copyright © 2017. Published by Elsevier B.V.

Mitigating operating room fires: development of a carbon dioxide fire prevention device.

PubMed

Culp, William C; Kimbrough, Bradly A; Luna, Sarah; Maguddayao, Aris J

2014-04-01

Operating room fires are sentinel events that present a real danger to surgical patients and occur at least as frequently as wrong-sided surgery. For fire to occur, the 3 points of the fire triad must be present: an oxidizer, an ignition source, and fuel source. The electrosurgical unit (ESU) pencil triggers most operating room fires. Carbon dioxide (CO2) is a gas that prevents ignition and suppresses fire by displacing oxygen. We hypothesize that a device can be created to reduce operating room fires by generating a cone of CO2 around the ESU pencil tip. One such device was created by fabricating a divergent nozzle and connecting it to a CO2 source. This device was then placed over the ESU pencil, allowing the tip to be encased in a cone of CO2 gas. The device was then tested in 21%, 50%, and 100% oxygen environments. The ESU was activated at 50 W cut mode while placing the ESU pencil tip on a laparotomy sponge resting on an aluminum test plate for up to 30 seconds or until the sponge ignited. High-speed videography was used to identify time of ignition. Each test was performed in each oxygen environment 5 times with the device activated (CO2 flow 8 L/min) and with the device deactivated (no CO2 flow-control). In addition, 3-dimensional spatial mapping of CO2 concentrations was performed with a CO2 sampling device. The median ± SD [range] ignition time of the control group in 21% oxygen was 2.9 s ± 0.44 [2.3-3.0], in 50% oxygen 0.58 s ± 0.12 [0.47-0.73], and in 100% oxygen 0.48 s ± 0.50 [0.03-1.27]. Fires were ignited with each control trial (15/15); no fires ignited when the device was used (0/15, P < 0.0001). The CO2 concentration at the end of the ESU pencil tip was 95%, while the average CO2 concentration 1 to 1.4 cm away from the pencil tip on the bottom plane was 64%. In conclusion, an operating room fire prevention device can be created by using a divergent nozzle design through which CO2 passes, creating a cone of fire suppressant. This device as demonstrated in a flammability model effectively reduced the risk of fire. CO2 3-dimensional spatial mapping suggests effective fire reduction at least 1 cm away from the tip of the ESU pencil at 8 L/min CO2 flow. Future testing should determine optimum CO2 flow rates and ideal nozzle shapes. Use of this device may substantially reduce the risk of patient injury due to operating room fires.

Review of vortices in wildland fire

Treesearch

Jason M. Forthofer; Scott L. Goodrick

2011-01-01

Vortices are almost always present in the wildland fire environment and can sometimes interact with the fire in unpredictable ways, causing extreme fire behavior and safety concerns. In this paper, the current state of knowledge of the interaction of wildland fire and vortices is examined and reviewed. A basic introduction to vorticity is given, and the two common...

40 CFR 30.18 - Hotel and motel fire safety.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 1 2013-07-01 2013-07-01 false Hotel and motel fire safety. 30.18... EDUCATION, HOSPITALS, AND OTHER NON-PROFIT ORGANIZATIONS Pre-Award Requirements § 30.18 Hotel and motel fire safety. The Hotel and Motel Fire Safety Act of 1990 (Public Law 101-391) establishes a number of fire...

40 CFR 30.18 - Hotel and motel fire safety.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 1 2014-07-01 2014-07-01 false Hotel and motel fire safety. 30.18... EDUCATION, HOSPITALS, AND OTHER NON-PROFIT ORGANIZATIONS Pre-Award Requirements § 30.18 Hotel and motel fire safety. The Hotel and Motel Fire Safety Act of 1990 (Public Law 101-391) establishes a number of fire...

40 CFR 30.18 - Hotel and motel fire safety.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 1 2012-07-01 2012-07-01 false Hotel and motel fire safety. 30.18... EDUCATION, HOSPITALS, AND OTHER NON-PROFIT ORGANIZATIONS Pre-Award Requirements § 30.18 Hotel and motel fire safety. The Hotel and Motel Fire Safety Act of 1990 (Public Law 101-391) establishes a number of fire...

40 CFR 30.18 - Hotel and motel fire safety.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 1 2011-07-01 2011-07-01 false Hotel and motel fire safety. 30.18... EDUCATION, HOSPITALS, AND OTHER NON-PROFIT ORGANIZATIONS Pre-Award Requirements § 30.18 Hotel and motel fire safety. The Hotel and Motel Fire Safety Act of 1990 (Public Law 101-391) establishes a number of fire...

Observations of fire-induced turbulence regimes during low-intensity wildland fires in forested environments: implications for smoke dispersion

Treesearch

Warren E. Heilman; Craig B. Clements; Daisuke Seto; Xindi Bian; Kenneth L. Clark; Nicholas S. Skowronski; John L. Hom

2015-01-01

Low-intensity wildland fires occurring beneath forest canopies can result in particularly adverse local air-quality conditions. Ambient and fire-induced turbulent circulations play a substantial role in the transport and dispersion of smoke during these fire events. Recent in situ measurements of fire–atmosphere interactions during low-...

Wildland fire in ecosystems: effects of fire on fauna

Treesearch

Jane Kapler Smith

2000-01-01

VOLUME 1: Fires affect animals mainly through effects on their habitat. Fires often cause short-term increases in wildlife foods that contribute to increases in populations of some animals. These increases are moderated by the animals' ability to thrive in the altered, often simplified, structure of the postfire environment. The extent of fire effects on animal...

Contrasting spatial patterns in active-fire and fire-suppressed Mediterranean climate old-growth mixed conifer forests

Treesearch

Danny L. Fry; Scott L. Stephens; Brandon M. Collins; Malcolm North; Ernesto Franco-Vizcaino; Samantha J. Gill

2014-01-01

In Mediterranean environments in western North America, historic fire regimes in frequent-fire conifer forests are highly variable both temporally and spatially. This complexity influenced forest structure and spatial patterns, but some of this diversity has been lost due to anthropogenic disruption of ecosystem processes, including fire. Information from reference...

40 CFR 30.18 - Hotel and motel fire safety.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 1 2010-07-01 2010-07-01 false Hotel and motel fire safety. 30.18... EDUCATION, HOSPITALS, AND OTHER NON-PROFIT ORGANIZATIONS Pre-Award Requirements § 30.18 Hotel and motel fire safety. The Hotel and Motel Fire Safety Act of 1990 (Public Law 101-391) establishes a number of fire...

Numerical modeling of laboratory-scale surface-to-crown fire transition

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Castle, Drew Clayton

Understanding the conditions leading to the transition of fire spread from a surface fuel to an elevated (crown) fuel is critical to effective fire risk assessment and management. Surface fires that successfully transition to crown fires can be very difficult to suppress, potentially leading to damages in the natural and built environments. This is relevant to chaparral shrub lands which are common throughout parts of the Southwest U.S. and represent a significant part of the wildland urban interface. The ability of the Wildland-Urban Interface Fire Dynamic Simulator (WFDS) to model surface-to-crown fire transition was evaluated through comparison to laboratory experiments. The WFDS model is being developed by the U.S. Forest Service (USFS) and the National Institute of Standards and Technology. The experiments were conducted at the USFS Forest Fire Laboratory in Riverside, California. The experiments measured the ignition of chamise (Adenostoma fasciculatum) crown fuel held above a surface fire spreading through excelsior fuel. Cases with different crown fuel bulk densities, crown fuel base heights, and imposed wind speeds were considered. Cold-flow simulations yielded wind speed profiles that closely matched the experimental measurements. Next, fire simulations with only the surface fuel were conducted to verify the rate of spread while factors such as substrate properties were varied. Finally, simulations with both a surface fuel and a crown fuel were completed. Examination of specific surface fire characteristics (rate of spread, flame angle, etc.) and the corresponding experimental surface fire behavior provided a basis for comparison of the factors most responsible for transition from a surface fire to the raised fuel ignition. The rate of spread was determined by tracking the flame in the Smokeview animations using a tool developed for tracking an actual flame in a video. WFDS simulations produced results in both surface fire spread and raised fuel bed ignition which closely matched the trends reported in the laboratory experiments.

A method for determining fire history in coniferous forests in the Mountain West

Treesearch

Stephen F. Arno; Kathy M. Sneck

1977-01-01

Describes a method for determining historic fire frequency, intensity, and size from cross sections collected from fire-scarred trees and tree age classes determined through increment borings. Tells how to interpret the influence of fire in stand composition and structure and how to identify effects of modern fire suppression.

Environmental Assessment for the Warren Station externally fired combined cycle demonstration project

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

NONE

1995-04-01

The proposed Penelec project is one of 5 projects for potential funding under the fifth solicitation under the Clean Coal Technology program. In Penelec, two existing boilers would be replaced at Warren Station, PA; the new unit would produce 73 MW(e) in a combined cycle mode (using both gas-fired and steam turbines). The project would fill the need for a full utility-size demonstration of externally fire combined cycle (EFCC) technology as the next step toward commercialization. This environmental assessment was prepared for compliance with NEPA; its purpose is to provide sufficient basis for determining whether to prepare an environmental impactmore » statement or to issue a finding of no significant impact. It is divided into the sections: purpose and need for proposed action; alternatives; brief description of affected environment; environmental consequences, including discussion of commercial operation beyond the demonstration period.« less

A Model of Generating Visual Place Cells Based on Environment Perception and Similar Measure.

PubMed

Zhou, Yang; Wu, Dewei

2016-01-01

It is an important content to generate visual place cells (VPCs) in the field of bioinspired navigation. By analyzing the firing characteristic of biological place cells and the existing methods for generating VPCs, a model of generating visual place cells based on environment perception and similar measure is abstracted in this paper. VPCs' generation process is divided into three phases, including environment perception, similar measure, and recruiting of a new place cell. According to this process, a specific method for generating VPCs is presented. External reference landmarks are obtained based on local invariant characteristics of image and a similar measure function is designed based on Euclidean distance and Gaussian function. Simulation validates the proposed method is available. The firing characteristic of the generated VPCs is similar to that of biological place cells, and VPCs' firing fields can be adjusted flexibly by changing the adjustment factor of firing field (AFFF) and firing rate's threshold (FRT).

A Model of Generating Visual Place Cells Based on Environment Perception and Similar Measure

PubMed Central

2016-01-01

It is an important content to generate visual place cells (VPCs) in the field of bioinspired navigation. By analyzing the firing characteristic of biological place cells and the existing methods for generating VPCs, a model of generating visual place cells based on environment perception and similar measure is abstracted in this paper. VPCs' generation process is divided into three phases, including environment perception, similar measure, and recruiting of a new place cell. According to this process, a specific method for generating VPCs is presented. External reference landmarks are obtained based on local invariant characteristics of image and a similar measure function is designed based on Euclidean distance and Gaussian function. Simulation validates the proposed method is available. The firing characteristic of the generated VPCs is similar to that of biological place cells, and VPCs' firing fields can be adjusted flexibly by changing the adjustment factor of firing field (AFFF) and firing rate's threshold (FRT). PMID:27597859

Integrating climatic and fuels information into National Fire Risk Decision Support Tools

Treesearch

W. Cooke; V. Anantharaj; C. Wax; J. Choi; K. Grala; M. Jolly; G.P. Dixon; J. Dyer; D.L. Evans; G.B. Goodrich

2007-01-01

The Wildland Fire Assessment System (WFAS) is a component of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service Decision Support Systems (DSS) that support fire potential modeling. Fire potential models for Mississippi and for Eastern fire environments have been developed as part of a National Aeronautic and Space Agency-funded study aimed at demonstrating the utility...

Ecohydrology: When will the jungle burn?

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bowman, David

2017-06-01

Fire weather indices are unsuited to forecast fire in tropical rainforests. Now research shows the area burnt across Borneo is related to drought-depleted water tables, presenting the opportunity to predict fire danger in these environments.

Fire history reconstruction in grassland ecosystems: amount of charcoal reflects local area burned

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Leys, Bérangère; Brewer, Simon C.; McConaghy, Scott; Mueller, Joshua; McLauchlan, Kendra K.

2015-11-01

Fire is one of the most prevalent disturbances in the Earth system, and its past characteristics can be reconstructed using charcoal particles preserved in depositional environments. Although researchers know that fires produce charcoal particles, interpretation of the quantity or composition of charcoal particles in terms of fire source remains poorly understood. In this study, we used a unique four-year dataset of charcoal deposited in traps from a native tallgrass prairie in mid-North America to test which environmental factors were linked to charcoal measurements on three spatial scales. We investigated small and large charcoal particles commonly used as a proxy of fire activity at different spatial scales, and charcoal morphotypes representing different types of fuel. We found that small (125-250 μm) and large (250 μm-1 mm) particles of charcoal are well-correlated (Spearman correlation = 0.88) and likely reflect the same spatial scale of fire activity in a system with both herbaceous and woody fuels. There was no significant relationship between charcoal pieces and fire parameters <500 m from the traps. Moreover, local area burned (<5 km distance radius from traps) explained the total charcoal amount, and regional burning (200 km radius distance from traps) explained the ratio of non arboreal to total charcoal (NA/T ratio). Charcoal variables, including total charcoal count and NA/T ratio, did not correlate with other fire parameters, vegetation cover, landscape, or climate variables. Thus, in long-term studies that involve fire history reconstructions, total charcoal particles, even of a small size (125-250 μm), could be an indicator of local area burned. Further studies may determine relationships among amount of charcoal recorded, fire intensity, vegetation cover, and climatic parameters.

A hydroclimatic model of global fire patterns

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Boer, Matthias

2015-04-01

Satellite-based earth observation is providing an increasingly accurate picture of global fire patterns. The highest fire activity is observed in seasonally dry (sub-)tropical environments of South America, Africa and Australia, but fires occur with varying frequency, intensity and seasonality in almost all biomes on Earth. The particular combination of these fire characteristics, or fire regime, is known to emerge from the combined influences of climate, vegetation, terrain and land use, but has so far proven difficult to reproduce by global models. Uncertainty about the biophysical drivers and constraints that underlie current global fire patterns is propagated in model predictions of how ecosystems, fire regimes and biogeochemical cycles may respond to projected future climates. Here, I present a hydroclimatic model of global fire patterns that predicts the mean annual burned area fraction (F) of 0.25° x 0.25° grid cells as a function of the climatic water balance. Following Bradstock's four-switch model, long-term fire activity levels were assumed to be controlled by fuel productivity rates and the likelihood that the extant fuel is dry enough to burn. The frequency of ignitions and favourable fire weather were assumed to be non-limiting at long time scales. Fundamentally, fuel productivity and fuel dryness are a function of the local water and energy budgets available for the production and desiccation of plant biomass. The climatic water balance summarizes the simultaneous availability of biologically usable energy and water at a site, and may therefore be expected to explain a significant proportion of global variation in F. To capture the effect of the climatic water balance on fire activity I focused on the upper quantiles of F, i.e. the maximum level of fire activity for a given climatic water balance. Analysing GFED4 data for annual burned area together with gridded climate data, I found that nearly 80% of the global variation in the 0.99 quantile of F (i.e. F_0.99 ) was explained by two terms of the climatic water balance: i) mean annual actual evapotranspiration (AET), which is a proxy for fuel productivity, and ii) mean annual water deficit (D=PET-AET, where PET is mean annual potential evapotranspiration), which is a measure of fuel drying potential. As expected, F_0.99 was close to zero in environments of low AET (e.g. deserts) or low D (e.g. wet forests), due to strong fuel productivity or fuel dryness constraints, and maximum for environments of intermediate AET and D (e.g. tropical savannas). The topography of the F_0.99 response surface was analysed to explore how the relative importance of fuel productivity and fuel dryness constraints varied with the climatic water balance, and geographically across the continents. Consistent with current understanding of global pyrogeography, the hydroclimatic fire model predicted that fire activity is mostly constrained by fuel productivity in arid environments with grassy fuels and by fuel dryness in humid environments with litter fuels derived from woody shrubs and trees. The model provides a simple, yet biophysically-based, approach to evaluating potential for incremental change in fire activity or transformational change in fire types under future climate conditions.

Development of the International Space Station (ISS) Fine Water Mist (FWM) Portable Fire Extinguisher

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Rodriquez, Branelle; Graf, John; Carlile, Christie; Young, GIna

2012-01-01

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) is developing a Fine Water Mist (FWM) Portable Fire Extinguisher (PFE) for use on the International Space Station (ISS). The ISS presently uses two different types of fire extinguishers: a water foam extinguisher in the Russian Segment, and a carbon dioxide extinguisher in the United States Orbital Segments, which include Columbus and Kibo pressurized elements. Currently, there are operational concerns with the emergency breathing equipment and the carbon dioxide extinguisher. The toxicity of the carbon dioxide requires the crew members to have an oxygen supply present during a fire event, therefore inherently creating an unsafe environment. The FWM PFE extinguishes a fire without creating a hazardous breathing environment for crew members. The following paper will discuss the unique functional and performance requirements that have been levied on the FWM PFE, identify unique microgravity design considerations for liquid and gas systems, as well as discuss the NASA ISS specific fire standards that were developed to establish an acceptable portable fire extinguisher s performance.

Charged Up for Fire Safety. Fifth Grade. Fire Safety for Texans: Fire and Burn Prevention Curriculum Guide.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Texas State Commission on Fire Protection, Austin.

This booklet comprises the fifth grade component of a series of curriculum guides on fire and burn prevention. Designed to meet the age-specific needs of fifth grade students, its objectives include: (1) exploring heating equipment safety, (2) analyzing the impact of fire on the outdoor environment and methods to reduce that impact, (3) developing…

Evaluation of micron size carbon fibers released from burning graphite composites

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Sussholz, B.

1980-01-01

Quantitative estimates were developed of micron carbon fibers released during the burning of graphite composites. Evidence was found of fibrillated particles which were the predominant source of the micron fiber data obtained from large pool fire tests. The fibrillation phenomena were attributed to fiber oxidation effects caused by the fire environment. Analysis of propane burn test records indicated that wind sources can cause considerable carbon fiber oxidation. Criteria estimates were determined for the number of micron carbon fibers released during an aircraft accident. An extreme case analysis indicated that the upper limit of the micron carbon fiber concentration level was only about half the permissible asbestos ceiling concentration level.

Bricks in historical buildings of Toledo City: characterisation and restoration

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Lopez-Arce, Paula; Garcia-Guinea, Javier; Gracia, Mercedes

2003-01-15

Two different types of ancient bricks (12th to 14th centuries) collected from historical buildings of Toledo (Spain) were characterised by optical microscopy, scanning electron microscopy/energy-dispersive X-ray spectrometers (SEM/EDS), electron probe microanalysis (EM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), differential thermal analysis (DTA) and {sup 57}Fe-Moessbauer spectroscopy. Physical properties such as water absorption and suction, porosity, density and compression strength were also determined. Several minerals found in the brick matrix, such as garnet, let us infer raw material sources; calcite, dolomite, illite and neoformed gehlenite and diopside phases, on temperature reached in firing; secondary calcite, on first cooling scenarios; and manganese micronodules, on latemore » pollution environments. XRD and DTA of original and refired samples supply information about firing temperatures. Additional data on firing conditions and type of the original clay are provided by the Moessbauer study. Physical properties of both types of bricks were compared and correlated with raw materials and fabric and firing technology employed. The physicochemical characterisation of these bricks provides valuable data for restoration purposes to formulate new specific bricks using neighbouring raw materials.« less

EVALUATION OF UTILITY BOILER RADIANT FURNACE RESIDENCE TIME/TEMPERATURE CHARACTERISTICS: FIELD TESTS AND HEAT TRANSFER MODELING

EPA Science Inventory

The report describes an investigation of the adequacy of a modeling approach in predicting the thermal environment and flow field of pulverized-coal-fired utility boilers. Two 420 MWe coal-fired boilers were evaluated: a single-wall-fired unit and a tangentially fired unit, repre...

Behavioral and cognitive evaluation of FireWorks education trunk

Treesearch

Linda R. Thomas; James A. Walsh; Jane Kapler Smith

2000-01-01

This study assessed the effectiveness of FireWorks, an educational trunk about wildland fire, in increasing student understanding, enabling students to apply classroom learning in a field setting, and improving the learning environment. Students who were in classrooms using the FireWorks educational trunk demonstrated more knowledge in both classroom and field-based...

Estimating fire properties by remote sensing

Treesearch

P. Riggan; J. Hoffman; J. Brass

2009-01-01

Contemporary knowledge of the role of fire in the global environment is limited by inadequate measurements of the extent and impact of individual fires. Observations by operational polar-orbiting and geostationary satellites provide an indication of fire occurrence but are ill-suited for estimating the temperature, area, or radiant emissions of active wildland and...

A Topological Paradigm for Hippocampal Spatial Map Formation Using Persistent Homology

PubMed Central

Dabaghian, Y.; Mémoli, F.; Frank, L.; Carlsson, G.

2012-01-01

An animal's ability to navigate through space rests on its ability to create a mental map of its environment. The hippocampus is the brain region centrally responsible for such maps, and it has been assumed to encode geometric information (distances, angles). Given, however, that hippocampal output consists of patterns of spiking across many neurons, and downstream regions must be able to translate those patterns into accurate information about an animal's spatial environment, we hypothesized that 1) the temporal pattern of neuronal firing, particularly co-firing, is key to decoding spatial information, and 2) since co-firing implies spatial overlap of place fields, a map encoded by co-firing will be based on connectivity and adjacency, i.e., it will be a topological map. Here we test this topological hypothesis with a simple model of hippocampal activity, varying three parameters (firing rate, place field size, and number of neurons) in computer simulations of rat trajectories in three topologically and geometrically distinct test environments. Using a computational algorithm based on recently developed tools from Persistent Homology theory in the field of algebraic topology, we find that the patterns of neuronal co-firing can, in fact, convey topological information about the environment in a biologically realistic length of time. Furthermore, our simulations reveal a “learning region” that highlights the interplay between the parameters in combining to produce hippocampal states that are more or less adept at map formation. For example, within the learning region a lower number of neurons firing can be compensated by adjustments in firing rate or place field size, but beyond a certain point map formation begins to fail. We propose that this learning region provides a coherent theoretical lens through which to view conditions that impair spatial learning by altering place cell firing rates or spatial specificity. PMID:22912564

Fire behavior modeling-a decision tool

Treesearch

Jack Cohen; Bill Bradshaw

1986-01-01

The usefulness of an analytical model as a fire management decision tool is determined by the correspondence of its descriptive capability to the specific decision context. Fire managers must determine the usefulness of fire models as a decision tool when applied to varied situations. Because the wildland fire phenomenon is complex, analytical fire spread models will...

Auditory Distance Coding in Rabbit Midbrain Neurons and Human Perception: Monaural Amplitude Modulation Depth as a Cue

PubMed Central

Zahorik, Pavel; Carney, Laurel H.; Bishop, Brian B.; Kuwada, Shigeyuki

2015-01-01

Mechanisms underlying sound source distance localization are not well understood. Here we tested the hypothesis that a novel mechanism can create monaural distance sensitivity: a combination of auditory midbrain neurons' sensitivity to amplitude modulation (AM) depth and distance-dependent loss of AM in reverberation. We used virtual auditory space (VAS) methods for sounds at various distances in anechoic and reverberant environments. Stimulus level was constant across distance. With increasing modulation depth, some rabbit inferior colliculus neurons increased firing rates whereas others decreased. These neurons exhibited monotonic relationships between firing rates and distance for monaurally presented noise when two conditions were met: (1) the sound had AM, and (2) the environment was reverberant. The firing rates as a function of distance remained approximately constant without AM in either environment and, in an anechoic condition, even with AM. We corroborated this finding by reproducing the distance sensitivity using a neural model. We also conducted a human psychophysical study using similar methods. Normal-hearing listeners reported perceived distance in response to monaural 1 octave 4 kHz noise source sounds presented at distances of 35–200 cm. We found parallels between the rabbit neural and human responses. In both, sound distance could be discriminated only if the monaural sound in reverberation had AM. These observations support the hypothesis. When other cues are available (e.g., in binaural hearing), how much the auditory system actually uses the AM as a distance cue remains to be determined. PMID:25834060

Depleted uranium mobility across a weapons testing site: isotopic investigation of porewater, earthworms, and soils.

PubMed

Oliver, Ian W; Graham, Margaret C; MacKenzie, Angus B; Ellam, Robert M; Farmer, John G

2008-12-15

The mobility and bioavailability of depleted uranium (DU) in soils at a UK Ministry of Defence (UK MoD) weapons testing range were investigated. Soil and vegetation were collected near a test-firing position and at eight points along a transect line extending approximately 200 m down-slope, perpendicular to the firing line, toward a small stream. Earthworms and porewaters were subsequently separated from the soils and both total filtered porewater (<0.2 microm) and discrete size fractions (0.2 microm-100 kDa, 100-30 kDa, 30-3 kDa, and <3 kDa)obtainedvia centrifugal ultrafiltration were examined. Uranium concentrations were determined by inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometry (ICP-OES) for soils and ICP-mass spectrometry (MS) for earthworms and porewaters, while 235U:238U atom ratios were determined by multicollector (MC)-ICP-MS. Comparison of the porewater and earthworm isotopic values with those of the soil solids indicated that DU released into the environment during weapons test-firing operations was more labile and more bioavailable than naturally occurring U in the soils at the testing range. Importantly, DU was shown to be present in soil porewater even at a distance of approximately 185 m from the test-firing position and, along the extent of the transect was apparently associated with organic colloids.

Increased heat resistance in mycelia from wood fungi prevalent in forests characterized by fire: a possible adaptation to forest fire.

PubMed

Carlsson, Fredrik; Edman, Mattias; Holm, Svante; Eriksson, Anna-Maria; Jonsson, Bengt Gunnar

2012-10-01

Forest fires have been the major stand-replacing/modifying disturbance in boreal forests. To adapt to fire disturbance, different strategies have evolved. This study focuses on wood fungi, and a specific adaptation to forest fire: increased heat resistance in their mycelia. Fifteen species of wood fungi were selected and a priori sorted in two groups according to their prevalence in fire-affected environments. The fungi were cultivated on fresh wood and exposed to 100, 140, 180, 220 °C for 5, 10, 15, 20 and 25 min. under laboratory conditions. A clear difference was found among the two groups. Species prevalent in fire-affected habitats had a much higher survival rate over all combinations of time and temperature compared to species associated with other environments. Thus, the results indicate that fire adaptation in terms of increased heat resistance in mycelia occurs in some species of wood fungi. Such adaptation will influence the ecology and population dynamics of wood fungi, as well as having implications for best practices during restoration fires. Copyright © 2012 The British Mycological Society. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Fire extinguishment and inhibition in spacecraft environments

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Deris, John

1987-01-01

It was concluded that it is essential that NASA develop a comprehensive approach to fire extinguishment and inerting in spacecraft environments. Electronic equipment might be easily protected through use of an onboard inert gas generating system. The use of Halon 1301 presents serious technological challenges for agent cleanup and removal of the toxic and corrosive products of combustion. Nitrogen pressurization, while effective, probably presents a serious weight penality. The use of liquid water sprays appears to be the most effective approach to general purpose spacecraft fire protection.

Effects of dormant-season fire at three different fire frequencies in shortgrass steppe of the southern Great Plains

Treesearch

Paulette L. Ford; Carleton S. White

2008-01-01

Prior to proceeding with large-scale fire reintroduction as a grassland management option, appropriate fire frequencies need to be determined. This research experimentally tested the effects of dormant-season fire on ground cover and on plant and soil nutrient cycling in shortgrass steppe at three different fire frequencies. The objective was to determine if fire...

Functional and environmental determinants of bark thickness in fire-free temperate rain forest communities.

PubMed

Richardson, Sarah J; Laughlin, Daniel C; Lawes, Michael J; Holdaway, Robert J; Wilmshurst, Janet M; Wright, Monique; Curran, Timothy J; Bellingham, Peter J; McGlone, Matt S

2015-10-01

In fire-prone ecosystems, variation in bark thickness among species and communities has been explained by fire frequency; thick bark is necessary to protect cambium from lethal temperatures. Elsewhere this investment is deemed unnecessary, and thin bark is thought to prevail. However, in rain forest ecosystems where fire is rare, bark thickness varies widely among species and communities, and the causes of this variation remain enigmatic. We tested for functional explanations of bark thickness variation in temperate rain forest species and communities. We measured bark thickness in 82 tree species throughout New Zealand temperate rain forests that historically have experienced little fire and applied two complementary analyses. First, we examined correlations between bark traits and leaf habit, and leaf and stem traits. Second, we calculated community-weighted mean (CWM) bark thickness for 272 plots distributed throughout New Zealand to identify the environments in which thicker-barked communities occur. Conifers had higher size-independent bark thickness than evergreen angiosperms. Species with thicker bark or higher bark allocation coefficients were not associated with "slow economic" plant traits. Across 272 forest plots, communities with thicker bark occurred on infertile soils, and communities with thicker bark and higher bark allocation coefficients occurred in cooler, drier climates. In non-fire-prone temperate rain forest ecosystems, investment in bark is driven by soil resources, cool minimum temperatures, and seasonal moisture stress. The role of these factors in fire-prone ecosystems warrants testing. © 2015 Botanical Society of America.

First application of the WEPP model to predict runoff and erosion risk in fire-affected volcanic areas in Europe

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Neris, Jonay; Robichaud, Peter R.; Elliot, William J.; Doerr, Stefan H.; Notario del Pino, Jesús S.; Lado, Marcos

2017-04-01

An estimated that 15% of the world's population lives in volcanic areas. Recent catastrophic erosion events following wildfires in volcanic terrain have highlighted the geomorphological instability of this soil type under disturbed conditions and steep slopes. Predicting the hydrological and erosional response of this soils in the post-fire period is the first step to design and develop adequate actions to minimize risks in the post-fire period. In this work we apply, for the first time, the Water Erosion Prediction Project model for predicting erosion and runoff events in fire-affected volcanic soils in Europe. Two areas affected by wildfires in 2015 were selected in Tenerife (Spain) representative of different fire behaviour (downhill surface fire with long residence time vs uphill crown fire with short residence time), severity (moderate soil burn severity vs light soil burn severity) and climatic conditions (average annual precipitation of 750 and 210 mm respectively). The actual erosion processes were monitored in the field using silt fences. Rainfall and rill simulations were conducted to determine hydrologic, interrill and rill erosion parameters. The soils were sampled and key properties used as model input, evaluated. During the first 18 months after the fire 7 storms produced runoff and erosion in the selected areas. Sediment delivery reached 5.4 and 2.5 Mg ha-1 respectively in the first rainfall event monitored after the fire, figures comparable to those reported for fire-affected areas of the western USA with similar climatic conditions but lower than those showed by wetter environments. The validation of the WEPP model using field data showed reasonable estimates of hillslope sediment delivery in the post-fire period and, therefore, it is suggested that this model can support land managers in volcanic areas in Europe in predicting post-fire hydrological and erosional risks and designing suitable mitigation treatments.

In Situ Tropical Peatland Fire Emission Factors and Their Variability, as Determined by Field Measurements in Peninsula Malaysia

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Smith, T. E. L.; Evers, S.; Yule, C. M.; Gan, J. Y.

2018-01-01

Fires in tropical peatlands account for >25% of estimated total greenhouse gas emissions from deforestation and degradation. Despite significant global and regional impacts, our understanding of specific gaseous fire emission factors (EFs) from tropical peat burning is limited to a handful of studies. Furthermore, there is substantial variability in EFs between sampled fires and/or studies. For example, methane EFs vary by 91% between studies. Here we present new fire EFs for the tropical peatland ecosystem; the first EFs measured for Malaysian peatlands, and only the second comprehensive study of EFs in this crucial environment. During August 2015 (under El Niño conditions) and July 2016, we embarked on field campaigns to measure gaseous emissions at multiple peatland fires burning on deforested land in Southeast Pahang (2015) and oil palm plantations in North Selangor (2016), Peninsula Malaysia. Gaseous emissions were measured using open-path Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy. The IR spectra were used to retrieve mole fractions of 12 different gases present within the smoke (including carbon dioxide and methane), and these measurements used to calculate EFs. Peat samples were taken at each burn site for physicochemical analysis and to explore possible relationships between specific physicochemical properties and fire EFs. Here we present the first evidence to indicate that substrate bulk density affects methane fire EFs reported here. This novel explanation of interplume, within-biome variability, should be considered by those undertaking greenhouse gas accounting and haze forecasting in this region and is of importance to peatland management, particularly with respect to artificial compaction.

Burning fire-prone Mediterranean shrublands: immediate changes in soil microbial community structure and ecosystem functions.

PubMed

Goberna, M; García, C; Insam, H; Hernández, M T; Verdú, M

2012-07-01

Wildfires subject soil microbes to extreme temperatures and modify their physical and chemical habitat. This might immediately alter their community structure and ecosystem functions. We burned a fire-prone shrubland under controlled conditions to investigate (1) the fire-induced changes in the community structure of soil archaea, bacteria and fungi by analysing 16S or 18S rRNA gene amplicons separated through denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis; (2) the physical and chemical variables determining the immediate shifts in the microbial community structure; and (3) the microbial drivers of the change in ecosystem functions related to biogeochemical cycling. Prokaryotes and eukaryotes were structured by the local environment in pre-fire soils. Fire caused a significant shift in the microbial community structure, biomass C, respiration and soil hydrolases. One-day changes in bacterial and fungal community structure correlated to the rise in total organic C and NO(3)(-)-N caused by the combustion of plant residues. In the following week, bacterial communities shifted further forced by desiccation and increasing concentrations of macronutrients. Shifts in archaeal community structure were unrelated to any of the 18 environmental variables measured. Fire-induced changes in the community structure of bacteria, rather than archaea or fungi, were correlated to the enhanced microbial biomass, CO(2) production and hydrolysis of C and P organics. This is the first report on the combined effects of fire on the three biological domains in soils. We concluded that immediately after fire the biogeochemical cycling in Mediterranean shrublands becomes less conservative through the increased microbial biomass, activity and changes in the bacterial community structure.

Mixed severity fire effects within the Rim fire: Relative importance of local climate, fire weather, topography, and forest structure

Treesearch

Van R. Kane; C. Alina Cansler; Nicholas A. Povak; Jonathan T. Kane; Robert J. McGaughey; James A. Lutz; Derek J. Churchill; Malcolm P. North

2015-01-01

Recent and projected increases in the frequency and severity of large wildfires in the western U.S. makes understanding the factors that strongly affect landscape fire patterns a management priority for optimizing treatment location. We compared the influence of variations in the local environment on burn severity patterns on the large 2013 Rim fire that burned under...

Bucklands Crossing firefighter burnover-a case study of fire behaviour and firefighter safety implications

Treesearch

H. Grant Pearce

2007-01-01

On March 24, 1998, a crew of eight rural firefighters were burned over while attempting to suppress a backburning sector of the Bucklands Crossing Fire in North Otago, New Zealand. The fire demonstrates how factors typical of the New Zealand fire environment – steep slopes, highly flammable shrub fuels, and a strong foehn wind effect – combined to produce extreme fire...

Analysis of the Large Urban Fire Environment. Part 1. Theory

DTIC Science & Technology

1982-07-01

the fire. It is the buoyancy-generated pressure forces, and not diffusive entrainment, that control the low-level induction of ambient air into the...18-- IV. RESULTS FLAMBEAU FIRES The multiple-fuel-bed Flambeau fires (Countryman, 1969; Palmer, 1981] were large, controlled burns conducted to...Station Northern Forest Fire Laboratory Alexandria, VA 22314 (12) Missoula, MT 59801 (1) Department of Defense 2. Mr. Clay F. Butler Command and Control

How the science of injury prevention contributes to advancing home fire safety in the USA: successes and opportunities.

PubMed

Gielen, Andrea C; Frattaroli, Shannon; Pollack, Keshia M; Peek-Asa, Corinne; Yang, Jingzhen G

2018-06-01

In the decades since the landmark report-America Burning-was published in 1973, the number of home fire deaths has shrunk from >5500 per year to 2650 in 2015. This paper: (1) describes how science and practice in injury prevention and fire and life safety contributed to successful interventions, and (2) identifies emerging strategies and future opportunities to prevent home fire-related deaths. The aims are addressed through the lens of population health research, with a focus on the work of selected Centers for Disease Control and Prevention-funded Injury Control Research Centers. Results are organised using the Haddon Matrix and an ecological model. We found evidence to support interventions that address all components of both the matrix and the model, including: reduced ignition propensity cigarettes, stop smoking campaigns, housing codes, residential sprinkler systems, smoke alarms, community risk reduction, school-based educational programmes, and fire and burn response systems. Future reductions are likely to come from enhancing residential sprinkler and smoke alarm technology, and increasing their utilisation; expanding the use of community risk reduction methods; and implementing new technological solutions. Despite the successes, substantial disparities in home fire death rates remain, reflecting underlying social determinants of health. Most of the evidence-supported interventions were focused on changing the policy and community environments to prevent home fires and reduce injury when a fire occurs. Future prevention efforts should give high priority to addressing the continued disparities in home fire deaths. © Article author(s) (or their employer(s) unless otherwise stated in the text of the article) 2018. All rights reserved. No commercial use is permitted unless otherwise expressly granted.

Living more safely in the chaparral-urban interface

Treesearch

Klaus W. H. Radtke

1983-01-01

Urban encroachment into chaparral areas has accelerated the fire-flood-erosion cycle. Preventative maintenance measures can help reduce the damage from fire and flood. This report describes the chaparral environment; how to cope with problems in watershed management, how to landscape for fire and soil erosion control, how to plan for home safety from fire, how to treat...

Training Effectiveness Evaluation (TEE) of the Advanced Fire Fighting Training System. Focus on the Trained Person.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cordell, Curtis C.; And Others

A training effectiveness evaluation of the Navy Advanced Fire Fighting Training System was conducted. This system incorporates simulated fires as well as curriculum materials and instruction. The fires are non-pollutant, computer controlled, and installed in a simulated shipboard environment. Two teams of 15 to 16 persons, with varying amounts of…

The bay area wildfire forum

Treesearch

Todd E. Bruce

1995-01-01

Fire agencies throughout the San Francisco Bay Area formed a grassroots organization to influence a firesafe environment. The Bay Area Wildfire Forum (BAWF) was organized in 1992 to coordinate wildland fire training while promoting and encouraging further activities regarding wildland firefighting and fire prevention.

Fire patterns in the Amazonian biome

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Aragao, Luiz E. O. C.; Shimabukuro, Yosio E.; Lima, Andre; Anderson, Liana O.; Barbier, Nicolas; Saatchi, Sassan

2010-05-01

This paper aims to provide an overview of our recent findings on the interplay between climate and land use dynamics in defining fire patterns in Amazonia. Understanding these relationships is currently a fundamental concern for assessing the vulnerability of Amazonia to climate change and its potential for mitigating current increases in atmospheric greenhouse gases. Reducing carbon emissions from tropical deforestation and forest degradation (REDD), for instance, could contribute to a cumulative emission reduction of 13-50 billion tons of carbon (GtC) by 2100. In Amazonia, though, forest fires can release similar quantities of carbon to the atmosphere (~0.2 GtC yr-1) as deforestation alone. Therefore, to achieve carbon savings through REDD mechanism there is an urgent need of understanding and subsequently restraining related Amazonian fire drivers. In this study, we analyze satellite-derived monthly and annual time-series of fires, rainfall and deforestation in Amazonia to: (1) quantify the seasonal patterns and relationships between these variables; (2) quantify fire and rainfall anomalies to evaluate the impact of recent drought on fire patterns; (3) quantify recent trends in fire and deforestation to understand how land use affects fire patterns in Amazonia. Our results demonstrate a marked seasonality of fires. The majority of fires occurs along the Arc of Deforestation, the expanding agricultural frontier in southern and eastern Amazonia, indicating humans are the major ignition sources determining fire seasonality, spatial distribution and long-term patterns. There is a marked seasonality of fires, which is highly correlated (p<0.05) with monthly rainfall and deforestation rates. Deforestation and fires reach their highest values three and six months, respectively, after the peak of the rainy season. This result clearly describes the impact of major human activities on fire incidence, which is generally characterized by the slash-and-burn of Amazonian vegetation for implementation of pastures and agricultural fields. The cumulative number of hot pixels is exponentially related to the monthly rainfall, which ultimately defines where and when fire can potentially strike. During the 2005 Amazonian drought, the number of hot pixels increased 33% in relation to mean 1998-2005. However, even with a large fraction of the basin experiencing considerable water deficits, fires have only affect areas with extensive human activity. Our spatially explicit trend analysis on deforestation and fire data revealed that more than half of the area experiencing increased fire occurrence have reduced deforestation rates. This reverse pattern is likely to be associated with the slash-and-burn of secondary forests and the increase of fragmentation and forest edges, favouring the leakage of fires from deforested lands into forests. Finally, our analysis points towards a reduction of fire incidence due to land use intensification in this region. In this study, we demonstrated that anthropogenic forcing, such as deforestation rates, is decisive in determining the seasonality and annual patterns of fire occurrence. Moreover, droughts can significantly increase the number of fires in the region exacerbating human impacts in Amazonia. Due to ongoing deforestation and the predicted intensification of climate change induced droughts, it is anticipated that a large area of forest edge will be under increased risk of fires and carbon savings from REDD may be partially offset by increased emissions following fire events. Improved fire-free land management practices may provide a sustainable solution for reducing emissions from the world's largest rainforest. Acknowledges The first author would like to thank the financial support of the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC-UK/grant NE/F015356/1).

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Sierra Thermal /Fluid Team

The SIERRA Low Mach Module: Fuego along with the SIERRA Participating Media Radiation Module: Syrinx, henceforth referred to as Fuego and Syrinx, respectively, are the key elements of the ASCI fire environment simulation project. The fire environment simulation project is directed at characterizing both open large-scale pool fires and building enclosure fires. Fuego represents the turbulent, buoyantly-driven incompressible flow, heat transfer, mass transfer, combustion, soot, and absorption coefficient model portion of the simulation software. Syrinx represents the participating-media thermal radiation mechanics. This project is an integral part of the SIERRA multi-mechanics software development project. Fuego depends heavily upon the coremore » architecture developments provided by SIERRA for massively parallel computing, solution adaptivity, and mechanics coupling on unstructured grids.« less

Reusable Solid Rocket Motor Nozzle Joint-4 Thermal Analysis

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Clayton, J. Louie

2001-01-01

This study provides for development and test verification of a thermal model used for prediction of joint heating environments, structural temperatures and seal erosions in the Space Shuttle Reusable Solid Rocket Motor (RSRM) Nozzle Joint-4. The heating environments are a result of rapid pressurization of the joint free volume assuming a leak path has occurred in the filler material used for assembly gap close out. Combustion gases flow along the leak path from nozzle environment to joint O-ring gland resulting in local heating to the metal housing and erosion of seal materials. Analysis of this condition was based on usage of the NASA Joint Pressurization Routine (JPR) for environment determination and the Systems Improved Numerical Differencing Analyzer (SINDA) for structural temperature prediction. Model generated temperatures, pressures and seal erosions are compared to hot fire test data for several different leak path situations. Investigated in the hot fire test program were nozzle joint-4 O-ring erosion sensitivities to leak path width in both open and confined joint geometries. Model predictions were in generally good agreement with the test data for the confined leak path cases. Worst case flight predictions are provided using the test-calibrated model. Analysis issues are discussed based on model calibration procedures.

Postfire encroachment of Fabiana imbricata is real? Assessing changes of shrubland occupation during 40 years in NW Patagonia steppe

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lasaponara, Rosa; Oddi, Facundo; Ghermandi, Luciana

2014-05-01

Landscapes are dynamic in space and time, being spatio-temporal processes of particular interest for landscape ecology. In particular, grasslands can change their structure through the expansion of shrubs in the landscape matrix. Shrub encroachment affect biodiversity as well as forage availability that is the key component of the productive use of rangelands. However, despite its recognition as a global problem, knowledge on the rates, dynamics and encroachment patterns is even scarce. For example, although it is generally accepted that fire control shrub encroachment, certain shrubby species could be favored by the occurrence of fire. In northwestern Patagonian steppe, Fabiana imbricata form large monospecific shrublands that are part of the landscape mosaic and its dynamics of regeneration is strongly related to fire. This long-lived shrub (≡ 150 years) is a typical seeder that is killed by fire and recruits seedlings almost exclusively in post-fire, establishing even-age patches. Our objective was to determine whether F. imbricata shrublands have expanded during the last 40 years in a landscape fire prone. The study area corresponds to San Ramon ranch (22,000 ha) located in northwestern Patagonia steppe, Argentina (latitude -41° 04'; longitude -70° 51'). Two distribution maps of the species were made that corresponds to the study area in 1968 and 2011. The 1968 map was elaborated from the digitalization of aerial photographs (1:45000) while the 2011 map was produced with very high resolution satellite images, current aerial photographs and GPS field data. Both maps were loaded into a GIS environment, in which landscape metrics at patch and class level were determined and then compared. From remote sensing and dendroecological techniques, we know that the study area was almost entirely affected by fires during the study period. Therefore, the comparison of both maps allows us to know post-fire changes in the shrublands spatial configuration at the landscape scale and to infer the fire effect on these changes. Our results show that during the studied period F. imbricata shrublands has expanded over the grassland. Nowadays, the species occupies 20% more area than in 1968 and this area, is divided into a smaller number of patches that are closer to each other. The observed change in the shrublands spatial pattern is evidence of a post-fire shrub encroachment. These results contribute to the understanding of the role of fire in vegetation dynamics in fire prone ecosystems

40 CFR Table 4 to Subpart IIIi of... - Emission Standards for Stationary Fire Pump Engines

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 6 2010-07-01 2010-07-01 false Emission Standards for Stationary Fire Pump Engines 4 Table 4 to Subpart IIII of Part 60 Protection of Environment ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION... of Performance for Stationary Compression Ignition Internal Combustion Engines Part 60, Subpt. IIII...

40 CFR Table 3 to Subpart IIIi of... - Certification Requirements for Stationary Fire Pump Engines

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 6 2010-07-01 2010-07-01 false Certification Requirements for Stationary Fire Pump Engines 3 Table 3 to Subpart IIII of Part 60 Protection of Environment ENVIRONMENTAL... Standards of Performance for Stationary Compression Ignition Internal Combustion Engines Part 60, Subpt...

Post-fire response of coast redwood one year after the Mendocino lightning complex fires

Treesearch

Robert B. Douglas; Tom. Bendurel

2012-01-01

Coast redwood (Sequoia sempervirens) forests have undergone significant changes over the past century and are now in state more conducive for wildfires. Because fires have been uncommon in redwood forests over the past 80 years, managers have limited data to make decisions about the post-fire environment. In June 2008, a series of lightning storms...

Yellow perch (Perca flavescens) mercury unaffected by wildland fires in northern Minnesota

Treesearch

Charlotte E. Riggs; Randall K. Kolka; Edward A. Nater; Emma L. Witt; Trent R. Wickman; Laurel G. Woodruff; Jason T. Butcher

2017-01-01

Wildland fire can alter mercury (Hg) cycling on land and in adjacent aquatic environments. In addition to enhancing local atmospheric Hg redeposition, fire can influence terrestrial movement of Hg and other elements into lakes via runoff from burned upland soil. However, the impact of fire on water quality and the accumulation of Hg in fish remain equivocal. We...

A framework for developing safe and effective large-fire response in a new fire management paradigm

Treesearch

Christopher J. Dunn; Matthew P. Thompson; David E. Calkin

2017-01-01

The impacts of wildfires have increased in recent decades because of historical forest and fire management, a rapidly changing climate, and an increasingly populated wildland urban interface. This increasingly complex fire environment highlights the importance of developing robust tools to support risk-informed decision making. While tools have been developed to aid...

Development of the International Space Station Fine Water Mist Portable Fire Extinguisher

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Rodriquez, Branelle; Young, GIna

2013-01-01

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) is developing a Fine Water Mist (FWM) Portable Fire Extinguisher (PFE) for use on the International Space Station (ISS). The ISS presently uses two different types of fire extinguishers: a water foam extinguisher in the Russian Segments, and a carbon dioxide extinguisher in the United States Orbital Segments, which include Columbus and Kibo pressurized elements. Currently, there are operational and compatibility concerns with the emergency breathing equipment and the carbon dioxide extinguisher. ISS emergency response breathing equipment does not filter carbon dioxide; therefore, crew members are required to have an oxygen supply present during a fire event since the carbon dioxide PFE creates an unsafe breathing environment. The ISS program recommended a nontoxic fire extinguisher to mitigate this operational risk. The FWM PFE can extinguish a fire without creating a hazardous breathing environment for crewmembers. This paper will discuss the unique functional and performance requirements that have been levied on the FWM PFE, identify unique microgravity design considerations for liquid and gas systems, and discuss the NASA ISS specific fire standards that were developed to establish an acceptable portable fire extinguisher s performance.

Phenology-based, remote sensing of post-burn disturbance windows in rangelands

USGS Publications Warehouse

Sankeya, Joel B.; Wallace, Cynthia S.A.; Ravi, Sujith

2013-01-01

Wildland fire activity has increased in many parts of the world in recent decades. Ecological disturbance by fire can accelerate ecosystem degradation processes such as erosion due to combustion of vegetation that otherwise provides protective cover to the soil surface. This study employed a novel ecological indicator based on remote sensing of vegetation greenness dynamics (phenology) to estimate variability in the window of time between fire and the reemergence of green vegetation. The indicator was applied as a proxy for short-term, post-fire disturbance windows in rangelands; where a disturbance window is defined as the time required for an ecological or geomorphic process that is altered to return to pre-disturbance levels. We examined variability in the indicator determined for time series of MODIS and AVHRR NDVI remote sensing data for a database of ∼100 historical wildland fires, with associated post-fire reseeding treatments, that burned 1990–2003 in cold desert shrub steppe of the Great Basin and Columbia Plateau of the western USA. The indicator-based estimates of disturbance window length were examined relative to the day of the year that fires burned and seeding treatments to consider effects of contemporary variability in fire regime and management activities in this environment. A key finding was that contemporary changes of increased length of the annual fire season could have indirect effects on ecosystem degradation, as early season fires appeared to result in longer time that soils remained relatively bare of the protective cover of vegetation after fires. Also important was that reemergence of vegetation did not occur more quickly after fire in sites treated with post-fire seeding, which is a strategy commonly employed to accelerate post-fire vegetation recovery and stabilize soil. Future work with the indicator could examine other ecological factors that are dynamic in space and time following disturbance – such as nutrient cycling, carbon storage, microbial community composition, or soil hydrology – as a function of disturbance windows, possibly using simulation modeling and historical wildfire information.

Effect of wearing personal protective clothing and self-contained breathing apparatus on heart rate, temperature and oxygen consumption during stepping exercise and live fire training exercises.

PubMed

Bruce-Low, S S; Cotterrell, D; Jones, G E

2007-01-15

Fire fighter breathing apparatus instructors (BAIs) must possess the ability to respond to both the extrinsic stress of a high temperature environment and the intrinsic stress from wearing personal protective equipment (PPE) and self-contained breathing apparatus (SCBA), repeatedly and regularly, whilst training recruits in live fire training exercises (LFTEs). There are few previous investigations on BAIs in hot environments such as LFTEs, since the main research focus has been on regular fire fighters undertaking exercises in temperate or fire conditions at a moderate to high exercise intensity. In this study, the intrinsic cardiovascular stress effects of wearing PPE + SCBA were first investigated using a step test whilst wearing gym kit (control), weighted gym kit (a rucksack weighted to the equivalent of PPE + SCBA) and full PPE + SCBA (weight plus the effects of protective clothing). The extrinsic effects of the very hot environment were investigated in BIAs in LFTEs compared to mock fire training exercises (MFTEs), where the fire was not ignited. There was an increase in heart rate due to the modest workload imposed on the BAIs through carrying out the MFTEs (25.0 (18.7)%) compared to resting. However, when exposed to fire during the LFTEs, heat storage appears to be significant as the heart rate increased by up to 39.8 (+/-20.1)% over that of the mock LFTEs at temperate conditions. Thus, being able to dissipate heat from the PPE is particularly important in reducing the cardiovascular responses for BAIs during LFTEs.

Emissions from Coal Fires and Their Impact on the Environment

USGS Publications Warehouse

Kolker, Allan; Engle, Mark; Stracher, Glenn; Hower, James; Prakash, Anupma; Radke, Lawrence; ter Schure, Arnout; Heffern, Ed

2009-01-01

Self-ignited, naturally occurring coal fires and fires resulting from human activities persist for decades in underground coal mines, coal waste piles, and unmined coal beds. These uncontrolled coal fires occur in all coal-bearing parts of the world (Stracher, 2007) and pose multiple threats to the global environment because they emit greenhouse gases - carbon dioxide (CO2), and methane (CH4) - as well as mercury (Hg), carbon monoxide (CO), and other toxic substances (fig. 1). The contribution of coal fires to the global pool of atmospheric CO2 is little known but potentially significant. For China, the world's largest coal producer, it is estimated that anywhere between 10 million and 200 million metric tons (Mt) of coal reserves (about 0.5 to 10 percent of production) is consumed annually by coal fires or made inaccessible owing to fires that hinder mining operations (Rosema and others, 1999; Voigt and others, 2004). At this proportion of production, coal amounts lost to coal fires worldwide would be two to three times that for China. Assuming this coal has mercury concentrations similar to those in U.S. coals, a preliminary estimate of annual Hg emissions from coal fires worldwide is comparable in magnitude to the 48 tons of annual Hg emissions from all U.S. coal-fired power-generating stations combined (U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 2002). In the United States, the combined cost of coal-fire remediation projects, completed, budgeted, or projected by the U.S. Department of the Interior's Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement (OSM), exceeds $1 billion, with about 90% of that in two States - Pennsylvania and West Virginia (Office of Surface Mining Enforcement and Reclamation, 2008; fig. 2). Altogether, 15 States have combined cumulative OSM coal-fire project costs exceeding $1 million, with the greatest overall expense occurring in States where underground coal fires are predominant over surface fires, reflecting the greater cost of extinguishing underground fires (fig. 2) (see 'Controlling Coal Fires'). In this fact sheet we review how coal fires occur, how they can be detected by airborne and remote surveys, and, most importantly, the impact coal-fire emissions may have on the environment and human health. In addition, we describe recent efforts by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) and collaborators to measure fluxes of CO2, CO, CH4, and Hg, using groundbased portable detectors, and combining these approaches with airborne thermal imaging and CO2 measurements. The goal of this research is to develop approaches that can be extrapolated to large fires and to extrapolate results for individual fires in order to estimate the contribution of coal fires as a category of global emissions.

Fire suppression in human-crew spacecraft

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Friedman, Robert; Dietrich, Daniel L.

1991-01-01

Fire extinguishment agents range from water and foam in early-design spacecraft (Halon 1301 in the present Shuttle) to carbon dioxide proposed for the Space Station Freedom. The major challenge to spacecraft fire extinguishment design and operations is from the micro-gravity environment, which minimizes natural convection and profoundly influences combustion and extinguishing agent effectiveness, dispersal, and post-fire cleanup. Discussed here are extinguishment in microgravity, fire-suppression problems anticipated in future spacecraft, and research needs and opportunities.

Aircraft fire safety research

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Botteri, Benito P.

1987-01-01

During the past 15 years, very significant progress has been made toward enhancing aircraft fire safety in both normal and hostile (combat) operational environments. Most of the major aspects of the aircraft fire safety problem are touched upon here. The technology of aircraft fire protection, although not directly applicable in all cases to spacecraft fire scenarios, nevertheless does provide a solid foundation to build upon. This is particularly true of the extensive research and testing pertaining to aircraft interior fire safety and to onboard inert gas generation systems, both of which are still active areas of investigation.

Assessment of the US EPA's determination of the role for CO2 capture and storage in new fossil fuel-fired power plants.

PubMed

Clark, Victoria R; Herzog, Howard J

2014-07-15

On September 20, 2013, the US Environmental and Protection Agency (EPA) proposed a revised rule for "Standards of Performance for Greenhouse Gas Emissions from New Stationary Sources: Electric Utility Generating Units". These performance standards set limits on the amount of carbon dioxide (CO2) that can be emitted per megawatt-hour (MWh) of electricity generation from new coal-fired and natural gas-fired power plants built in the US. These limits were based on determinations of "best system of emission reduction (BSER) adequately demonstrated". Central in this determination was evaluating whether Carbon Dioxide Capture and Storage (CCS) qualified as BSER. The proposed rule states that CCS qualifies as BSER for coal-fired generation but not for natural gas-fired generation. In this paper, we assess the EPA's analysis that resulted in this determination. We are not trying to judge what the absolute criteria are for CCS as the BSER but only the relative differences as related to coal- vs natural gas-fired technologies. We conclude that there are not enough differences between "base load" coal-fired and natural gas-fired power plants to justify the EPA's determination that CCS is the BSER for coal-fired power plants but not for natural gas-fired power plants.

Recent Developments for Satellite-Based Fire Monitoring in Canada

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Abuelgasim, A.; Fraser, R.

2002-05-01

Wildfires in Canadian forests are a major source of natural disturbance. These fires have a tremendous impact on the local environment, humans and wildlife, ecosystem function, weather, and climate. Approximately 9000 fires burn 3 million hectares per year in Canada (based on a 10-year average). While only 2 to 3 percent of these wildfires grow larger than 200 hectares in size, they account for almost 97 percent of the annual area burned. This provides an excellent opportunity to monitor active fires using a combination of low and high resolution sensors for the purpose of determining fire location and burned areas. Given the size of Canada, the use of remote sensing data is a cost-effective way to achieve a synoptic overview of large forest fire activity in near-real time. In 1998 the Canada Centre for Remote Sensing (CCRS) and the Canadian Forest Service (CFS) developed a system for Fire Monitoring, Mapping and Modelling (Fire M3;http://fms.nofc.cfs.nrcan.gc.ca/FireM3/). Fire M3 automatically identifies, monitors, and maps large forest fires on a daily basis using NOAA AVHRR data. These data are processed daily using the GEOCOMP-N satellite image processing system. This presentation will describe recent developments to Fire M3, included the addition of a set of algorithms tailored for NOAA-16 (N-16) data. The two fire detection algorithms are developed for N-16 day and night-time daily data collection. The algorithms exploit both the multi-spectral and thermal information from the AVHRR daily images. The set of N-16 day and night algorithms was used to generate daily active fire maps across North America for the 2001 fire season. Such a combined approach for fire detection leads to an improved detection rate, although day-time detection based on the new 1.6 um channel was much less effective (note - given the low detection rate with day time imagery, I don't think we can make the statement about capturing the diurnal cycle). Selected validation sites in western Canada and the United States showed reasonable correspondence with the location of fires mapped by CFS and those mapped by the USDA Forest Service using conventional means.

Human and climatic influences on fire occurrence in California's north coast range

Treesearch

Carl Skinner; Celeste Abbott; Danny Fry; Scott Stephens; Alan Taylor; Valerie Trouet

2009-01-01

Outside of the immediate coastal environments, little is known of fire history in the North Coast Range of California. Fire scar specimens were collected from ponderosa pine (Pinus ponderosa C. Lawson), sugar pine (Pinus lambertiana Douglas), incense cedar (Calocedrus decurrens [Torr] Florin), and...

Thermal Response of UHMWPE Materials in a Flash Flame Test Environment

DTIC Science & Technology

2014-11-13

Evaluation of Flame Resistant Clothing for Protection Against Fire Simulations Using an Instrumented Manikin. Several UHMWPE fabrics were tested underneath...PROTECTIVE CLOTHING COTTON FLASH FLAMES UNDERGARMENTS TEST AND EVALUATION FABRICS FLAME TESTING FIRE ...PROTECTION FIRE RESISTANT TEXTILES UHMWPE(ULTRA HIGH MOLECULAR WEIGHT POLYETHYLENE

Shared community patterns following experimental fire in a semiarid grassland

Treesearch

Paulette L. Ford

2007-01-01

This paper presents a synthesis of experimental research testing effects of seasonal fire on community structure of plants, arthropods, and small mammals in shortgrass steppe. These groups of plants and animals share the same environment, and therefore, the species in the groups were predicted to respond in a similar way to changes in their environment resulting from...

Atmospheric Effects of Biomass Burning

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Thompson, Anne M.

2000-01-01

Biomass fires are both natural and anthropogenic in origin. The natural trigger is lightning, which leads to mid- and high-latitude fires and episodes of smoke and pollution associated with them. Lightning is also prominent in tropical regions when the dry season gives way to the wet season and lightning in convective systems ignites dry vegetation. Atmospheric consequences of biomass fires are complex. When considering the impacts of fires for a given ecosystem, inputs of fires must be compared to other process that emit trace gases and particles into the atmosphere. Other processes include industrial activity, fires for household purposes and biogenic sources which may themselves interact with fires. That is, fires may promote or restrict biogenic processes. Several books have presented various aspects of fire interactions with atmospheric chemistry and a cross-disciplinary review of a 1992 fire-oriented experiment appears in SAFARI: The Role of southern African Fires in Atmospheric and Ecological Environments. The IGAC/BIBEX core activity (see acronyms at end of Chapter) has sponsored field campaigns that integrate multiple aspects of fires ground-based measurements with an ecological perspective, atmospheric measurements with chemical and meteorological components, and remote sensing. This Chapter presents two aspects of biomass fires and the environment. Namely, the relationship between biomass burning and ozone is described, starting with a brief description of the chemical reactions involved and illustrative measurements and interpretation. Second, because of the need to observe biomass burning and its consequences globally, a summary of remote sensing approaches to the study of fires and trace gases is given. Examples in this Chapter are restricted to tropical burning for matters of brevity and because most burning activity globally is within this zone.

Plume Particle Collection and Sizing from Static Firing of Solid Rocket Motors

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Sambamurthi, Jay K.

1995-01-01

Thermal radiation from the plume of any solid rocket motor, containing aluminum as one of the propellant ingredients, is mainly from the microscopic, hot aluminum oxide particles in the plume. The plume radiation to the base components of the flight vehicle is primarily determined by the plume flowfield properties, the size distribution of the plume particles, and their optical properties. The optimum design of a vehicle base thermal protection system is dependent on the ability to accurately predict this intense thermal radiation using validated theoretical models. This article describes a successful effort to collect reasonably clean plume particle samples from the static firing of the flight simulation motor (FSM-4) on March 10, 1994 at the T-24 test bed at the Thiokol space operations facility as well as three 18.3% scaled MNASA motors tested at NASA/MSFC. Prior attempts to collect plume particles from the full-scale motor firings have been unsuccessful due to the extremely hostile thermal and acoustic environment in the vicinity of the motor nozzle.

Monitoring of 2007 wildfires in GA and CA by GOES Aerosol/Smoke Product (ASP): Comparisons to MODIS and CALIPSO

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Xu, C.; Kondragunta, S.

2008-05-01

The purpose of this study is to understand the potential for using the GOES Aerosol/Smoke Product (GASP) to monitor wild fires over the United States. GASP AOD is retrieved using visible imagery from Geostationary Operational Environment Satellite (GOES) at 30 minute interval. This high temporal estimate of AOD provides significantly dense information of air quality in near real time. Hourly or daily animations of GASP aerosol optical depth for smoke plumes suggest that development and variation of wild fires can be determined by GASP. Also, the performances of GASP AOD are compared to other satellite data from MODerate-resolution Imaging Spectro- radiometers (MODIS) and Cloud-Aerosol Lidar and Infrared Pathfinder Satellite Observations (CALIPSO). The results reveal that GOES AOD has same level performance for monitoring wild fires as those of MODIS and CALIPSO. Therefore, we believe that the retrieval accuracy of GOES is adequate for monitoring larger outbreaks of aerosol events.

Multisensor Network System for Wildfire Detection Using Infrared Image Processing

PubMed Central

Bosch, I.; Serrano, A.; Vergara, L.

2013-01-01

This paper presents the next step in the evolution of multi-sensor wireless network systems in the early automatic detection of forest fires. This network allows remote monitoring of each of the locations as well as communication between each of the sensors and with the control stations. The result is an increased coverage area, with quicker and safer responses. To determine the presence of a forest wildfire, the system employs decision fusion in thermal imaging, which can exploit various expected characteristics of a real fire, including short-term persistence and long-term increases over time. Results from testing in the laboratory and in a real environment are presented to authenticate and verify the accuracy of the operation of the proposed system. The system performance is gauged by the number of alarms and the time to the first alarm (corresponding to a real fire), for different probability of false alarm (PFA). The necessity of including decision fusion is thereby demonstrated. PMID:23843734

Multisensor network system for wildfire detection using infrared image processing.

PubMed

Bosch, I; Serrano, A; Vergara, L

2013-01-01

This paper presents the next step in the evolution of multi-sensor wireless network systems in the early automatic detection of forest fires. This network allows remote monitoring of each of the locations as well as communication between each of the sensors and with the control stations. The result is an increased coverage area, with quicker and safer responses. To determine the presence of a forest wildfire, the system employs decision fusion in thermal imaging, which can exploit various expected characteristics of a real fire, including short-term persistence and long-term increases over time. Results from testing in the laboratory and in a real environment are presented to authenticate and verify the accuracy of the operation of the proposed system. The system performance is gauged by the number of alarms and the time to the first alarm (corresponding to a real fire), for different probability of false alarm (PFA). The necessity of including decision fusion is thereby demonstrated.

New Technologies Being Developed for the Thermophoretic Sampling of Smoke Particulates in Microgravity

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Sheredy, William A.

2003-01-01

The Characterization of Smoke Particulate for Spacecraft Fire Detection, or Smoke, microgravity experiment is planned to be performed in the Microgravity Science Glovebox Facility on the International Space Station (ISS). This investigation, which is being developed by the NASA Glenn Research Center, ZIN Technologies, and the National Institute of Standards and Technologies (NIST), is based on the results and experience gained from the successful Comparative Soot Diagnostics experiment, which was flown as part of the USMP-3 (United States Microgravity Payload 3) mission on space shuttle flight STS-75. The Smoke experiment is designed to determine the particle size distributions of the smokes generated from a variety of overheated spacecraft materials and from microgravity fires. The objective is to provide the data that spacecraft designers need to properly design and implement fire detection in spacecraft. This investigation will also evaluate the performance of the smoke detectors currently in use aboard the space shuttle and ISS for the test materials in a microgravity environment.

Catastrophic fat tails and non-smooth damage functions-fire economics and climate change adaptation for public policy

Treesearch

Adriana Keeting; John Handmer

2013-01-01

South-eastern Australia is one of the most fire prone environments on earth. Devastating fires in February 2009 appear to have been off the charts climatically and economically, they led to a new category of fire danger aptly called 'catastrophic'. Almost all wildfire losses have been associated with these extreme conditions and climate change will see an...

Tree regeneration spatial patterns in ponderosa pine forests following stand-replacing fire: Influence of topography and neighbors

Treesearch

Justin P. Ziegler; Chad M. Hoffman; Paula J. Fornwalt; Carolyn H. Sieg; Michael A. Battaglia; Marin E. Chambers; Jose M. Iniguez

2017-01-01

Shifting fire regimes alter forest structure assembly in ponderosa pine forests and may produce structural heterogeneity following stand-replacing fire due, in part, to fine-scale variability in growing environments. We mapped tree regeneration in eighteen plots 11 to 15 years after stand-replacing fire in Colorado and South Dakota, USA. We used point pattern analyses...

Lead particle size and its association with firing conditions and range maintenance: implications for treatment.

PubMed

Dermatas, Dimitris; Chrysochoou, Maria

2007-08-01

Six firing range soils were analyzed, representing different environments, firing conditions, and maintenance practices. The particle size distribution and lead (Pb) concentration in each soil fraction were determined for samples obtained from the backstop berms. The main factors that were found to influence Pb fragment size were the type of soil used to construct the berms and the type of weapon fired. The firing of high velocity weapons, i.e., rifles, onto highly angular soils induced significant fragmentation of the bullets and/or pulverization of the soil itself. This resulted in the accumulation of Pb in the finer soil fractions and the spread of Pb contamination beyond the vicinity of the backstop berm. Conversely, the use of clay as backstop and the use of low velocity pistols proved to be favorable for soil clean-up and range maintenance, since Pb was mainly present as large metallic fragments that can be recovered by a simple screening process. Other factors that played important roles in Pb particle size distribution were soil chemistry, firing distance, and maintenance practices, such as the use of water spray for dust suppression and deflectors prior to impact. Overall, coarse Pb particles provide much easier and more cost-effective maintenance, soil clean-up, and remediation via physical separation. Fine Pb particles release Pb more easily, pose an airborne Pb hazard, and require the application of stabilization/solidification treatment methods. Thus, to ensure sustainable firing range operations by means of cost-effective design, maintenance, and clean-up, especially when high velocity weapons are used, the above mentioned factors should be carefully considered.

Experimental validation of finite element model analysis of a steel frame in simulated post-earthquake fire environments

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Huang, Ying; Bevans, W. J.; Xiao, Hai; Zhou, Zhi; Chen, Genda

2012-04-01

During or after an earthquake event, building system often experiences large strains due to shaking effects as observed during recent earthquakes, causing permanent inelastic deformation. In addition to the inelastic deformation induced by the earthquake effect, the post-earthquake fires associated with short fuse of electrical systems and leakage of gas devices can further strain the already damaged structures during the earthquakes, potentially leading to a progressive collapse of buildings. Under these harsh environments, measurements on the involved building by various sensors could only provide limited structural health information. Finite element model analysis, on the other hand, if validated by predesigned experiments, can provide detail structural behavior information of the entire structures. In this paper, a temperature dependent nonlinear 3-D finite element model (FEM) of a one-story steel frame is set up by ABAQUS based on the cited material property of steel from EN 1993-1.2 and AISC manuals. The FEM is validated by testing the modeled steel frame in simulated post-earthquake environments. Comparisons between the FEM analysis and the experimental results show that the FEM predicts the structural behavior of the steel frame in post-earthquake fire conditions reasonably. With experimental validations, the FEM analysis of critical structures could be continuously predicted for structures in these harsh environments for a better assistant to fire fighters in their rescue efforts and save fire victims.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Muhleman, T.; Dempsey, P.

Examples of new technology in drilling reflect, for the most part, the industry's determination to overcome harsh drilling environments and to improve drilling efficiency through new methods and better equipment. The technology addressed includes a BOP fire prevention device; a diverter systems for floaters; a unique telescoping derrick; Sohio's mobile drilling island; more power from existing SCR's; a radio-based MWD system; better field tool joint inspection; a combined drilling/production platform, and a subsea BOP protection method.

Concept of an Active Amplification Mechanism in the Infrared Organ of Pyrophilous Melanophila Beetles

PubMed Central

Schneider, Erik S.; Schmitz, Anke; Schmitz, Helmut

2015-01-01

Jewel beetles of the genus Melanophila possess a pair of metathoracic infrared (IR) organs. These organs are used for forest fire detection because Melanophila larvae can only develop in fire killed trees. Several reports in the literature and a modeling of a historic oil tank fire suggest that beetles may be able to detect large fires by means of their IR organs from distances of more than 100 km. In contrast, the highest sensitivity of the IR organs, so far determined by behavioral and physiological experiments, allows a detection of large fires from distances up to 12 km only. Sensitivity thresholds, however, have always been determined in non-flying beetles. Therefore, the complete micromechanical environment of the IR organs in flying beetles has not been taken into consideration. Because the so-called photomechanic sensilla housed in the IR organs respond bimodally to mechanical as well as to IR stimuli, it is proposed that flying beetles make use of muscular energy coupled out of the flight motor to considerably increase the sensitivity of their IR sensilla during intermittent search flight sequences. In a search flight the beetle performs signal scanning with wing beat frequency while the inputs of the IR organs on both body sides are compared. By this procedure the detection of weak IR signals could be possible even if the signals are hidden in the thermal noise. If this proposed mechanism really exists in Melanophila beetles, their IR organs could even compete with cooled IR quantum detectors. The theoretical concept of an active amplification mechanism in a photon receptor innervated by highly sensitive mechanoreceptors is presented in this article. PMID:26733883

Concept of an Active Amplification Mechanism in the Infrared Organ of Pyrophilous Melanophila Beetles.

PubMed

Schneider, Erik S; Schmitz, Anke; Schmitz, Helmut

2015-01-01

Jewel beetles of the genus Melanophila possess a pair of metathoracic infrared (IR) organs. These organs are used for forest fire detection because Melanophila larvae can only develop in fire killed trees. Several reports in the literature and a modeling of a historic oil tank fire suggest that beetles may be able to detect large fires by means of their IR organs from distances of more than 100 km. In contrast, the highest sensitivity of the IR organs, so far determined by behavioral and physiological experiments, allows a detection of large fires from distances up to 12 km only. Sensitivity thresholds, however, have always been determined in non-flying beetles. Therefore, the complete micromechanical environment of the IR organs in flying beetles has not been taken into consideration. Because the so-called photomechanic sensilla housed in the IR organs respond bimodally to mechanical as well as to IR stimuli, it is proposed that flying beetles make use of muscular energy coupled out of the flight motor to considerably increase the sensitivity of their IR sensilla during intermittent search flight sequences. In a search flight the beetle performs signal scanning with wing beat frequency while the inputs of the IR organs on both body sides are compared. By this procedure the detection of weak IR signals could be possible even if the signals are hidden in the thermal noise. If this proposed mechanism really exists in Melanophila beetles, their IR organs could even compete with cooled IR quantum detectors. The theoretical concept of an active amplification mechanism in a photon receptor innervated by highly sensitive mechanoreceptors is presented in this article.

Radiant energy dosimeter for field use

Treesearch

A. Broido; A.W. McMasters

1967-01-01

Thermal radiation measurements in Project Flambeau fires involved a limited number of conventional radiometers located outside the fire periphery. A simple, cheap, easily-fabricated, light-weight, self-contained, rugged dosimeter was desired to withstand a hot fire environment, including a specific energy input of 5,000 cal cm -2, and to record...

Fluid dynamics structures in a fire environment observed in laboratory-scale experiments

Treesearch

J. Lozano; W. Tachajapong; D.R. Weise; S. Mahalingam; M. Princevac

2010-01-01

Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV) measurements were performed in laboratory-scale experimental fires spreading across horizontal fuel beds composed of aspen (Populus tremuloides Michx) excelsior. The continuous flame, intermittent flame, and thermal plume regions of a fire were investigated. Utilizing a PIV system, instantaneous velocity fields for...

40 CFR 75.12 - Specific provisions for monitoring NOX emission rate.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-07-01

...) AIR PROGRAMS (CONTINUED) CONTINUOUS EMISSION MONITORING Monitoring Provisions § 75.12 Specific provisions for monitoring NOX emission rate. (a) Coal-fired units, gas-fired nonpeaking units or oil-fired... 40 Protection of Environment 16 2010-07-01 2010-07-01 false Specific provisions for monitoring NOX...

40 CFR 75.12 - Specific provisions for monitoring NOX emission rate.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-07-01

...) AIR PROGRAMS (CONTINUED) CONTINUOUS EMISSION MONITORING Monitoring Provisions § 75.12 Specific provisions for monitoring NOX emission rate. (a) Coal-fired units, gas-fired nonpeaking units or oil-fired... 40 Protection of Environment 17 2013-07-01 2013-07-01 false Specific provisions for monitoring NOX...

40 CFR 75.12 - Specific provisions for monitoring NOX emission rate.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-07-01

...) AIR PROGRAMS (CONTINUED) CONTINUOUS EMISSION MONITORING Monitoring Provisions § 75.12 Specific provisions for monitoring NOX emission rate. (a) Coal-fired units, gas-fired nonpeaking units or oil-fired... 40 Protection of Environment 17 2014-07-01 2014-07-01 false Specific provisions for monitoring NOX...

40 CFR 75.12 - Specific provisions for monitoring NOX emission rate.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-07-01

...) AIR PROGRAMS (CONTINUED) CONTINUOUS EMISSION MONITORING Monitoring Provisions § 75.12 Specific provisions for monitoring NOX emission rate. (a) Coal-fired units, gas-fired nonpeaking units or oil-fired... 40 Protection of Environment 16 2011-07-01 2011-07-01 false Specific provisions for monitoring NOX...

40 CFR 75.12 - Specific provisions for monitoring NOX emission rate.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-07-01

...) AIR PROGRAMS (CONTINUED) CONTINUOUS EMISSION MONITORING Monitoring Provisions § 75.12 Specific provisions for monitoring NOX emission rate. (a) Coal-fired units, gas-fired nonpeaking units or oil-fired... 40 Protection of Environment 17 2012-07-01 2012-07-01 false Specific provisions for monitoring NOX...

Chapter 11. Vegetative manipulation with prescribed burning

Treesearch

Steven G. Whisenant

2004-01-01

Plant responses to fire differ because of phenological variations at the time of burning, inherently different susceptibilities to heat damage, differing regenerative abilities, and different responses to the postfire environment. Individual plants of the same or different species may have different responses to fire because of local variations in fire temperature or...

Alien plant dynamics following fire in mediterranean-climate California shrublands

USGS Publications Warehouse

Keeley, J.E.; Baer-Keeley, M.; Fotheringham, C.J.

2005-01-01

Over 75 species of alien plants were recorded during the first five years after fire in southern California shrublands, most of which were European annuals. Both cover and richness of aliens varied between years and plant association. Alien cover was lowest in the first postfire year in all plant associations and remained low during succession in chaparral but increased in sage scrub. Alien cover and richness were significantly correlated with year (time since disturbance) and with precipitation in both coastal and interior sage scrub associations. Hypothesized factors determining alien dominance were tested with structural equation modeling. Models that included nitrogen deposition and distance from the coast were not significant, but with those variables removed we obtained a significant model that gave an R2 = 0.60 for the response variable of fifth year alien dominance. Factors directly affecting alien dominance were (1) woody canopy closure and (2) alien seed banks. Significant indirect effects were (3) fire intensity, (4) fire history, (5) prefire stand structure, (6) aridity, and (7) community type. According to this model the most critical factor influencing aliens is the rapid return of the shrub and subshrub canopy. Thus, in these communities a single functional type (woody plants) appears to the most critical element controlling alien invasion and persistence. Fire history is an important indirect factor because it affects both prefire stand structure and postfire alien seed banks. Despite being fire-prone ecosystems, these shrublands are not adapted to fire per se, but rather to a particular fire regime. Alterations in the fire regime produce a very different selective environment, and high fire frequency changes the selective regime to favor aliens. This study does not support the widely held belief that prescription burning is a viable management practice for controlling alien species on semiarid landscapes. ?? 2005 by the Ecological Society of America.

Progress in Fire Detection and Suppression Technology for Future Space Missions

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Friedman, Robert; Urban, David L.

2000-01-01

Fire intervention technology (detection and suppression) is a critical part of the strategy of spacecraft fire safety. This paper reviews the status, trends, and issues in fire intervention, particularly the technology applied to the protection of the International Space Station and future missions beyond Earth orbit. An important contribution to improvements in spacecraft fire safety is the understanding of the behavior of fires in the non-convective (microgravity) environment of Earth-orbiting and planetary-transit spacecraft. A key finding is the strong influence of ventilation flow on flame characteristics, flammability limits and flame suppression in microgravity. Knowledge of these flow effects will aid the development of effective processes for fire response and technology for fire suppression.

A review of challenges to determining and demonstrating efficiency of large fire management

Treesearch

Matthew P. Thompson; Francisco Rodriguez y Silva; David E. Calkin; Michael S. Hand

2017-01-01

Characterising the impacts of wildland fire and fire suppression is critical information for fire management decision-making. Here, we focus on decisions related to the rare larger and longer-duration fire events, where the scope and scale of decision-making can be far broader than initial response efforts, and where determining and demonstrating efficiency of...

Zero Gravity Aircraft Testing of a Prototype Portable Fire Extinguisher for Use in Spacecraft

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Butz, J.; Carriere, T.; Abbud-Madrid, A.; Easton, J.

2012-01-01

For the past five years ADA Technologies has been developing a portable fire extinguisher (PFE) for use in microgravity environments. This technology uses fine water mist (FWM) to effectively and efficiently extinguish fires representative of spacecraft hazards. Recently the FWM PFE was flown on a Zero-G (reduced gravity) aircraft to validate the performance of the technology in a microgravity environment. Test results demonstrated that droplet size distributions generated in the reduced gravity environment were in the same size range as data collected during normal gravity (1-g) discharges from the prototype PFE. Data taken in an obscured test configuration showed that the mist behind the obstacle was more dense in the low-g environment when compared to 1-g discharges. The mist behind the obstacle tended to smaller droplet sizes in both the low-g and 1-g test conditions.

Risks, designs, and research for fire safety in spacecraft

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Friedman, Robert; Sacksteder, Kurt R.; Urban, David

1991-01-01

Current fire protection for spacecraft relies mainly on fire prevention through the use of nonflammable materials and strict storage controls of other materials. The Shuttle also has smoke detectors and fire extinguishers, using technology similar to aircraft practices. While experience has shown that the current fire protection is adequate, future improvements in fire safety technology to meet the challenges of long duration space missions, such as the Space Station Freedom, are essential. All spacecraft fire protection systems, however, must deal with the unusual combustion characteristics and operational problems in the low gravity environment. The features of low gravity combustion that affect spacecraft fire safety, and the issues in fire protection for Freedom that must be addressed eventually to provide effective and conservative fire protection systems are discussed.

Consequence modeling using the fire dynamics simulator.

PubMed

Ryder, Noah L; Sutula, Jason A; Schemel, Christopher F; Hamer, Andrew J; Van Brunt, Vincent

2004-11-11

The use of Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) and in particular Large Eddy Simulation (LES) codes to model fires provides an efficient tool for the prediction of large-scale effects that include plume characteristics, combustion product dispersion, and heat effects to adjacent objects. This paper illustrates the strengths of the Fire Dynamics Simulator (FDS), an LES code developed by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), through several small and large-scale validation runs and process safety applications. The paper presents two fire experiments--a small room fire and a large (15 m diameter) pool fire. The model results are compared to experimental data and demonstrate good agreement between the models and data. The validation work is then extended to demonstrate applicability to process safety concerns by detailing a model of a tank farm fire and a model of the ignition of a gaseous fuel in a confined space. In this simulation, a room was filled with propane, given time to disperse, and was then ignited. The model yields accurate results of the dispersion of the gas throughout the space. This information can be used to determine flammability and explosive limits in a space and can be used in subsequent models to determine the pressure and temperature waves that would result from an explosion. The model dispersion results were compared to an experiment performed by Factory Mutual. Using the above examples, this paper will demonstrate that FDS is ideally suited to build realistic models of process geometries in which large scale explosion and fire failure risks can be evaluated with several distinct advantages over more traditional CFD codes. Namely transient solutions to fire and explosion growth can be produced with less sophisticated hardware (lower cost) than needed for traditional CFD codes (PC type computer verses UNIX workstation) and can be solved for longer time histories (on the order of hundreds of seconds of computed time) with minimal computer resources and length of model run. Additionally results that are produced can be analyzed, viewed, and tabulated during and following a model run within a PC environment. There are some tradeoffs, however, as rapid computations in PC's may require a sacrifice in the grid resolution or in the sub-grid modeling, depending on the size of the geometry modeled.

Development of multi-year land cover data to assess wildfire impacts to coastal watersheds and the nearshore environment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Morrison, Katherine D.

In the Mediterranean ecosystems of coastal California, wildfire is a common disturbance that can significantly alter vegetation in watersheds that transport sediment and nutrients to the adjacent nearshore oceanic environment. We assess the impact of two wildfires that burned in 2008 on land cover and to the nearshore environment along the Big Sur coast in central California. We created a multi-year land cover dataset to assess changes to coastal watersheds as a result of fire. This land cover dataset was then used to model changes in nonpoint source pollutants transported to the nearshore environment. Results indicate post-fire increases in percent export compared to pre-fire years and also link wildfire severity to the specific land cover changes that subsequently increase exports of pollutants and sediment to the nearshore environment. This approach is a replicable across watersheds and also provides a framework for including the nearshore environment as a value at risk terrestrial land management revolving around wildfire, including suppression, thinning, and other activities that change land cover at a landscape scale.

Loss of Military Performance due to Individual NBC Protection in a Tropic Environment (belasting en prestatieverlies door individuele nbc-beschermin gin de tropen)

DTIC Science & Technology

2006-08-01

SMP) 1 Trg Area 1330-1430 SMP 2 Trg Area 16 nov 0800-0900 SMP 3 Trg Area 0930-1200 Offensive Fire - LIVE FIRE Range 1 Range Complex 1300-1530 Command...Control Evaluation (C2) 1 Range Complex 1600-1700 SMP 4 Trg Area 17 nov 0930-1200 Defensive Fire - LIVE FIRE Range 2 Range Complex 1300-1530 Command...Control Evaluation (C2) 2 Range Complex 18 nov 0800-0900 SMP 5 Trg Area 0930-1200 Offensive Fire - LIVE FIRE Range 2 Range Complex 1300-1530

Warning signals for eruptive events in spreading fires.

PubMed

Fox, Jerome M; Whitesides, George M

2015-02-24

Spreading fires are noisy (and potentially chaotic) systems in which transitions in dynamics are notoriously difficult to predict. As flames move through spatially heterogeneous environments, sudden shifts in temperature, wind, or topography can generate combustion instabilities, or trigger self-stabilizing feedback loops, that dramatically amplify the intensities and rates with which fires propagate. Such transitions are rarely captured by predictive models of fire behavior and, thus, complicate efforts in fire suppression. This paper describes a simple, remarkably instructive physical model for examining the eruption of small flames into intense, rapidly moving flames stabilized by feedback between wind and fire (i.e., "wind-fire coupling"-a mechanism of feedback particularly relevant to forest fires), and it presents evidence that characteristic patterns in the dynamics of spreading flames indicate when such transitions are likely to occur. In this model system, flames propagate along strips of nitrocellulose with one of two possible modes of propagation: a slow, structured mode, and a fast, unstructured mode sustained by wind-fire coupling. Experimental examination of patterns in dynamics that emerge near bifurcation points suggests that symptoms of critical slowing down (i.e., the slowed recovery of the system from perturbations as it approaches tipping points) warn of impending transitions to the unstructured mode. Findings suggest that slowing responses of spreading flames to sudden changes in environment (e.g., wind, terrain, temperature) may anticipate the onset of intense, feedback-stabilized modes of propagation (e.g., "blowup fires" in forests).

24 CFR 232.620 - Determination of compliance by HHS.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-04-01

... of Fire Safety Equipment Special Requirements § 232.620 Determination of compliance by HHS. An... the fire safety equipment has been installed, will be in compliance with the HHS requirements for fire... Security Act upon the installation of the fire safety equipment. The architectural exhibits, as approved...

Mean-field theory of a plastic network of integrate-and-fire neurons.

PubMed

Chen, Chun-Chung; Jasnow, David

2010-01-01

We consider a noise-driven network of integrate-and-fire neurons. The network evolves as result of the activities of the neurons following spike-timing-dependent plasticity rules. We apply a self-consistent mean-field theory to the system to obtain the mean activity level for the system as a function of the mean synaptic weight, which predicts a first-order transition and hysteresis between a noise-dominated regime and a regime of persistent neural activity. Assuming Poisson firing statistics for the neurons, the plasticity dynamics of a synapse under the influence of the mean-field environment can be mapped to the dynamics of an asymmetric random walk in synaptic-weight space. Using a master equation for small steps, we predict a narrow distribution of synaptic weights that scales with the square root of the plasticity rate for the stationary state of the system given plausible physiological parameter values describing neural transmission and plasticity. The dependence of the distribution on the synaptic weight of the mean-field environment allows us to determine the mean synaptic weight self-consistently. The effect of fluctuations in the total synaptic conductance and plasticity step sizes are also considered. Such fluctuations result in a smoothing of the first-order transition for low number of afferent synapses per neuron and a broadening of the synaptic-weight distribution, respectively.

SIERRA Low Mach Module: Fuego User Manual Version 4.46.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Sierra Thermal/Fluid Team

2017-09-01

The SIERRA Low Mach Module: Fuego along with the SIERRA Participating Media Radiation Module: Syrinx, henceforth referred to as Fuego and Syrinx, respectively, are the key elements of the ASCI fire environment simulation project. The fire environment simulation project is directed at characterizing both open large-scale pool fires and building enclosure fires. Fuego represents the turbulent, buoyantly-driven incompressible flow, heat transfer, mass transfer, combustion, soot, and absorption coefficient model portion of the simulation software. Syrinx represents the participating-media thermal radiation mechanics. This project is an integral part of the SIERRA multi-mechanics software development project. Fuego depends heavily upon the coremore » architecture developments provided by SIERRA for massively parallel computing, solution adaptivity, and mechanics coupling on unstructured grids.« less

SIERRA Low Mach Module: Fuego Theory Manual Version 4.44

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Sierra Thermal /Fluid Team

2017-04-01

The SIERRA Low Mach Module: Fuego along with the SIERRA Participating Media Radiation Module: Syrinx, henceforth referred to as Fuego and Syrinx, respectively, are the key elements of the ASCI fire environment simulation project. The fire environment simulation project is directed at characterizing both open large-scale pool fires and building enclosure fires. Fuego represents the turbulent, buoyantly-driven incompressible flow, heat transfer, mass transfer, combustion, soot, and absorption coefficient model portion of the simulation software. Syrinx represents the participating-media thermal radiation mechanics. This project is an integral part of the SIERRA multi-mechanics software development project. Fuego depends heavily upon the coremore » architecture developments provided by SIERRA for massively parallel computing, solution adaptivity, and mechanics coupling on unstructured grids.« less

SIERRA Low Mach Module: Fuego Theory Manual Version 4.46.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Sierra Thermal/Fluid Team

The SIERRA Low Mach Module: Fuego along with the SIERRA Participating Media Radiation Module: Syrinx, henceforth referred to as Fuego and Syrinx, respectively, are the key elements of the ASCI fire environment simulation project. The fire environment simulation project is directed at characterizing both open large-scale pool fires and building enclosure fires. Fuego represents the turbulent, buoyantly-driven incompressible flow, heat transfer, mass transfer, combustion, soot, and absorption coefficient model portion of the simulation software. Syrinx represents the participating-media thermal radiation mechanics. This project is an integral part of the SIERRA multi-mechanics software development project. Fuego depends heavily upon the coremore » architecture developments provided by SIERRA for massively parallel computing, solution adaptivity, and mechanics coupling on unstructured grids.« less

Identification of novel strain-specific and environment-dependent minor QTLs linked to fire blight resistance in apples

USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

Since its first report almost 200 years ago, fire blight, caused by the gram negative bacterium Erwinia amylovora, has threatened apple and pear production globally. Identifying novel genes and their functional alleles is a prerequisite to developing apple cultivars with enhanced fire blight resist...

Fire-induced water repellency: An erosional factor in wildland environments

Treesearch

Leonard F. DeBano

2000-01-01

Watershed managers and scientists throughout the world have been aware of fire-induced water-repellent soils for over three decades. Water repellency affects many hydrologic processes, including infiltration, overland flow, and surface erosion (rill and sheet erosion). This paper describes; the formation of fire-induced water-repellent soils, the effect of soil water...

Fire, Habitat structure and herpetofauna in the Southeast

Treesearch

Cathryn H. Greenberg

2002-01-01

In this paper I review studies of herpetofauna in two fire-maintained, xeric pineland southeastern U.S. ecosystems, longleaf pine-turkey oak sandhills and Florida sand pine scrub. I address evolutionary adaptations of herpetofauna to these xeric environments, and how fire disturbance influences herpetofaunal community composition by structuring habitat. Where data are...

Artificial Intelligence Applications to Fire Management

Treesearch

Don J. Latham

1987-01-01

Artificial intelligence could be used in Forest Service fire management and land-use planning to a larger degree than is now done. Robots, for example, could be programmed to monitor for fire and insect activity, to keep track of wildlife, and to do elementary thinking about the environment. Catching up with the fast-changing technology is imperative.

The effect of intraoral suction on oxygen-enriched surgical environments: a mechanism for reducing the risk of surgical fires.

PubMed

VanCleave, Andrea M; Jones, James E; McGlothlin, James D; Saxen, Mark A; Sanders, Brian J; Vinson, LaQuia A

2014-01-01

In this study, a mechanical model was applied in order to replicate potential surgical fire conditions in an oxygen-enriched environment with and without high-volume suction typical for dental surgical applications. During 41 trials, 3 combustion events were measured: an audible pop, a visible flash of light, and full ignition. In at least 11 of 21 trials without suction, all 3 conditions were observed, sometimes with an extent of fire that required early termination of the experimental trial. By contrast, in 18 of 20 with-suction trials, ignition did not occur at all, and in the 2 cases where ignition did occur, the fire was qualitatively a much smaller, candle-like flame. Statistically comparing these 3 combustion events in the no-suction versus with-suction trials, ignition (P = .0005), audible pop (P = .0211), and flash (P = .0092) were all significantly more likely in the no-suction condition. These results suggest a possible significant and new element to be added to existing surgical fire safety protocols toward making surgical fires the "never-events" they should be.

Grasshopper fecundity responses to grazing and fire in a tallgrass prairie.

PubMed

Laws, Angela N; Joern, Anthony

2011-10-01

Grasshopper abundance and diversity vary with management practices such as fire and grazing. Understanding how grasshopper life history traits such as fecundity respond to management practices is key to predicting grasshopper population dynamics in heterogeneous environments. Landscape-level experimental fire and bison grazing treatments at the Konza Prairie Biological Station (Manhattan, KS) provide an opportunity to examine how management affects grasshopper fecundity. Here we report on grasshopper fecundity for nine common species at Konza Prairie. From 2007 to 2009, adult female grasshoppers were collected every 3 wk from eight watersheds that varied in fire and grazing treatments. Fecundity was measured by examining female reproductive tracts, which contain a record of past and current reproductive activity. Body size was a poor predictor of fecundity for all species. Despite large differences in vegetation structure and composition with management regime (grazing and fire interval), we observed little effect of management on grasshopper fecundity. Habitat characteristics (grasshopper density, vegetation biomass, and vegetation quality; measured in 2008 and 2009) were better predictors of past fecundity than current fecundity, with species-specific responses. Fecundity increased throughout the summer, indicating that grasshoppers were able to acquire sufficient nutritional resources for egg production in the early fall when vegetation quality is generally low. Because fecundity did not vary across management treatments, population stage structure may be more important for determining population level reproduction than management regime at Konza Prairie.

Physical and mechanical properties of quarry dust waste incorporated into fired clay brick

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kadir, A. A.; Hassan, M. I. H.; Sarani, N. A.; Rahim, A. S. Abdul; Ismail, N.

2017-04-01

A large amount of quarry dust waste is dispose into landfills every year. This waste was obtained as a by-product during the production of aggregates through the crushing process of rocks in rubble crusher units. The increasing value of waste will have significant impact towards health and environment. Recycling such wastes by incorporating them into building materials is a practical solution for pollution problem. Therefore, this research was to examine the possibility of quarry dust to be incorporated in fired clay bricks. In this research, the composition and concentration of heavy metals were determined by using X-Ray Fluorescence Spectrometer (XRF). The research also consists of physical and mechanical properties of the fired clay bricks by utilizing quarry dust waste. Brick was manufactured by incorporating different percentages of quarry dust waste which are 0%, 10%, 20% and 30%. All bricks sample was tested with physical and mechanical properties which were density, shrinkage, initial rate of suction (IRS) and compressive strength of the fired bricks. Furthermore, the density and shrinkage were also in standard range. All physical and mechanical results were complied with the BS 3921:1985 standard. The comprehensive experimental work described in this research investigated the possibility of incorporating quarry dust into fired clay bricks. These materials could be an alternative low cost material for brick and at the same time provide a new disposal method for the waste.

Postfire Forest Recovery in California's National Forests

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Welch, K.; Young, T.; Safford, H.

2012-12-01

Due to fire suppression policies and other management practices over the last century, many low- to mid-elevation forest types in the Sierra Nevada have accumulated high fuel loads that promote stand-replacing high-intensity fires. Current and future projected trends in climate are predicted to increase the occurrence of such fires. We established over 1,000 plots in a range of elevations, environments, forest types, climate zones and fire severity classes to provide insight into the factors that promote natural tree regeneration after wildfires, the limiting factors in species establishment, and the differences in post-fire responses of conifers and hardwoods. We employed a standardized protocol that measured site characteristics, seedling densities, and woody plant growth. Preliminary results reveal that fire severity generally has a unimodal relationship with rates of natural regeneration, although effects of site and local environment act to modulate the shape of the relationship. Above low to moderate severities, natural regeneration rates of all tree species decrease with increasing severity, possibly due to a combination of factors including seed mortality, increasing distance to the nearest living seed tree, and more severe microclimatic conditions. Though hardwoods (oaks) are able to both seed and resprout from top-killed root crowns in a postfire environment, conifers still have the numerical advantage over hardwoods through seeding alone. We did not find evidence that shrubs have a strong either facilitative or competitive effect on conifer seedling establishment or growth in the first five years of forest recovery. Understanding forest recovery and regeneration processes after high severity fires is critical to appropriately applying management strategies on National Forest lands.

/sup 239/Pu contamination in snakes inhabiting the Rocky Flats Plant site

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Geiger, R.A.; Winsor, T.F.

1975-01-01

For approximately four years studies have been under way at the Rocky Flats plant to determine contamination patterns and concentrations of Pu in the biota. Contamination of the Rocky Flats environs has resulted from at least three incidents, a September 1957 fire, a May 1969 fire, and leaking barrels containing plutonium-laden cutting oil. The latter incident was considered by far the major source of the plutonium contamination. Results are reported from a study conducted to determine whether snake tissues of the area contained detectable amounts of /sup 239/Pu and, if so, at what concentrations. Eastern yellow-bellied racers (Coluber constrictor flaviventris,more » bullsnakes (Pituophis melanoleucus sayi, and prairie rattlesnakes (Crotalus viridis viridis, were collected for /sup 239/Pu bioassay of lung, liver, and bone tissues. Snakes were captured using drift fences terminating in funnel traps and by opportunistic sampling. Results led to the conclusion that snakes are not an important organism in the redistribution of /sup 239/Pu. (CH)« less

Increased Variability and Asymmetric Expansion of the Hippocampal Spatial Representation in a Distal Cue-Dependent Memory Task.

PubMed

Park, Seong-Beom; Lee, Inah

2016-08-01

Place cells in the hippocampus fire at specific positions in space, and distal cues in the environment play critical roles in determining the spatial firing patterns of place cells. Many studies have shown that place fields are influenced by distal cues in foraging animals. However, it is largely unknown whether distal-cue-dependent changes in place fields appear in different ways in a memory task if distal cues bear direct significance to achieving goals. We investigated this possibility in this study. Rats were trained to choose different spatial positions in a radial arm in association with distal cue configurations formed by visual cue sets attached to movable curtains around the apparatus. The animals were initially trained to associate readily discernible distal cue configurations (0° vs. 80° angular separation between distal cue sets) with different food-well positions and then later experienced ambiguous cue configurations (14° and 66°) intermixed with the original cue configurations. Rats showed no difficulty in transferring the associated memory formed for the original cue configurations when similar cue configurations were presented. Place field positions remained at the same locations across different cue configurations, whereas stability and coherence of spatial firing patterns were significantly disrupted when ambiguous cue configurations were introduced. Furthermore, the spatial representation was extended backward and skewed more negatively at the population level when processing ambiguous cue configurations, compared with when processing the original cue configurations only. This effect was more salient for large cue-separation conditions than for small cue-separation conditions. No significant rate remapping was observed across distal cue configurations. These findings suggest that place cells in the hippocampus dynamically change their detailed firing characteristics in response to a modified cue environment and that some of the firing properties previously reported in a foraging task might carry more functional weight than others when tested in a distal-cue-dependent memory task. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Development of fire test methods for airplane interior materials

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Tustin, E. A.

1978-01-01

Fire tests were conducted in a 737 airplane fuselage at NASA-JSC to characterize jet fuel fires in open steel pans (simulating post-crash fire sources and a ruptured airplane fuselage) and to characterize fires in some common combustibles (simulating in-flight fire sources). Design post-crash and in-flight fire source selections were based on these data. Large panels of airplane interior materials were exposed to closely-controlled large scale heating simulations of the two design fire sources in a Boeing fire test facility utilizing a surplused 707 fuselage section. Small samples of the same airplane materials were tested by several laboratory fire test methods. Large scale and laboratory scale data were examined for correlative factors. Published data for dangerous hazard levels in a fire environment were used as the basis for developing a method to select the most desirable material where trade-offs in heat, smoke and gaseous toxicant evolution must be considered.

Factors involved in dental surgery fires: a review of the literature.

PubMed

VanCleave, Andrea M; Jones, James E; McGlothlin, James D; Saxen, Mark A; Sanders, Brian J; Walker, LaQuia A

2014-01-01

Surgical fires are well-characterized, readily preventable, potentially devastating operating room catastrophes that continue to occur from 20 to 100 times per year or, by one estimate, up to 600 times per year in US operating rooms, sometimes with fatal results. The most significant risk factors for surgical fires involve (a) the use of an ignition source, such as laser or electrocautery equipment, in or around an oxygen-enriched environment in the head, neck, and upper torso area and (b) the concurrent delivery of supplemental oxygen, especially via nasal cannula. Nonetheless, while these 2 conditions occur very commonly in dental surgery, especially in pediatric dental surgery where sedation and anesthesia are regularly indicated, there is a general absence of documented dental surgical fires in the literature. Barring the possibility of underreporting for fear of litigation, this may suggest that there is another mechanism or mechanisms present in dental or pediatric dental surgery that mitigates this worst-case risk of surgical fires. Some possible explanations for this include: greater fire safety awareness by dental practitioners, incidental ventilation of oxygen-enriched environments in patient oral cavities due to breathing, or suction used by dental practitioners during procedures. This review of the literature provides a background to suggest that the practice of using intraoral suction in conjunction with the use of supplemental oxygen during dental procedures may alter the conditions needed for the initiation of intraoral fires. To date, there appear to be no published studies describing the ability of intraoral suctioning devices to alter the ambient oxygen concentration in an intraoral environment. In vivo models that would allow examination of intraoral suction on the ambient oxygen concentration in a simulated intraoral environment may then provide a valuable foundation for evaluating the safety of current clinical dental surgical practices, particularly in regard to the treatment of children.

Fuel age and fire spread: Natural conditions versus opportunities for fire suppression

USGS Publications Warehouse

Halsey, Richard W.; Keeley, Jon E.; Wilson, Kit

2009-01-01

Wildfires are driven and restrained by an interplay of variables that can lead to many potential outcomes. As every wildland firefighter learns in basic training, the ability of a fire to spread is determined by three basic variables: fuel type and condition, weather, and topography. Fire suppression obviously plays a significant role in determining fire spread as well, so firefighter activity becomes an additional variable.

78 FR 70530 - Notice of Determination; New and Revised Treatments for the Imported Fire Ant Program

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2013-11-26

...] Notice of Determination; New and Revised Treatments for the Imported Fire Ant Program AGENCY: Animal and... adding or revising certain treatment schedules for the Imported Fire Ant Program in the Plant Protection... imported fire ant program. Based on the treatment evaluation document, the environmental assessment, and...

Production and efficiency of large wildland fire suppression effort: A stochastic frontier analysis

Treesearch

Hari Katuwal; Dave Calkin; Michael S. Hand

2016-01-01

This study examines the production and efficiency of wildland fire suppression effort. We estimate the effectiveness of suppression resource inputs to produce controlled fire lines that contain large wildland fires using stochastic frontier analysis. Determinants of inefficiency are identified and the effects of these determinants on the daily production of...

Fire safety concerns in space operations

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Friedman, Robert

1987-01-01

This paper reviews the state-of-the-art in fire control techniques and identifies important issues for continuing research, technology, and standards. For the future permanent orbiting facility, the space station, fire prevention and control calls for not only more stringent fire safety due to the long-term and complex missions, but also for simplified and flexible safety rules to accommodate the variety of users. Future research must address a better understanding of the microgravity space environment as it influences fire propagation and extinction and the application of the technology of fire detection, extinguishment, and material assessment. Spacecraft fire safety should also consider the adaptation of methods and concepts derived from aircraft and undersea experience.

What is a natural wildfire regime in the Mediterranean? A comparison of Holocene and Eemian fire history at Ioannina, Greece

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lawson, Ian; Venevsky, Sergey; Sitch, Stephen; Tzedakis, Pc; Roucoux, Kh; Frogley, Mr

2010-05-01

Wildfire is an important element of the Earth system, responsible to a large extent for determining vegetation structure, contributing to global carbon cycling, and destructive of human life and property. Understanding wildfire behaviour can help us to predict how fire regimes are likely to change in future and to devise appropriate management strategies. One challenge in studying wildfire is to unpick the relative importance of human activity as a factor; in many densely-populated areas of the world, such as the Mediterranean, the majority of vegetation fires are thought to be started accidentally or deliberately by people. This makes it difficult to establish whether the fire frequency and/or intensity experienced today are unusual, in historical terms; whether ecosystems are in equilibrium with modern fire regimes, or are in the process of adjusting to them; and it makes it difficult to determine what an "appropriate" level of burning should be, given that complete elimination of fire is likely in the long run to be detrimental to plant communities that have evolved in environments where burning occurred naturally. Here we present new data from a lake sediment sequence from Lake Ioannina in NW Greece. The sequence contains varying amounts of charcoal, which can be interpreted as a proxy for the intensity and/or frequency of burning in the lake's catchment. Sub-fossil pollen allow us to reconstruct past vegetation communities, and stable isotope data provide some indication of local variations in past climate, supplemented by regional syntheses of other palaeoclimatic data and results of climate modelling experiments. The sediment sequence spans several interglacial-glacial cycles. Here we compare the charcoal, pollen and stable isotope records of the present interglacial, the Holocene, with the last interglacial, the Eemian. Although there are some known climatic differences between the two periods, the overwhelming difference between them is that hominin activity is thought to have been much more limited during the Eemian: the archaeological record from Greece before c. 40,000 years ago is exceedingly sparse, suggesting very little human activity. We argue therefore that the Eemian record can be used to give a reasonably good indication of what modern vegetation and fire conditions might be like without human influence. A detailed interpretation of the interaction between climate, vegetation and fire regime, informed by insights from the fire modules of the LPJ dynamic global vegetation model, provides further assessment of the main controls on Mediterranean fire regimes both with and without significant human influence.

First Responder Immersive Training Environment (FRITSE): Development of a Games-Based Simulator for CBRN First Responder Training

DTIC Science & Technology

2014-11-01

SV © Her Majesty the Queen in Right of Canada, as represented by the Minister of National Defence, 2014 © Sa Majesté la Reine (en droit du Canada... dragged over to fire hydrants to be attached to the steamer caps. Bolt cutters can be used to cut holes in fences allowing better access to the train...derailment fire. Ground monitors (for blitz fire) can be positioned for fire attack. 65mm attack lines can be dragged from fire engines and

Bursting as a source of non-linear determinism in the firing patterns of nigral dopamine neurons

PubMed Central

Jeong, Jaeseung; Shi, Wei-Xing; Hoffman, Ralph; Oh, Jihoon; Gore, John C.; Bunney, Benjamin S.; Peterson, Bradley S.

2012-01-01

Nigral dopamine (DA) neurons in vivo exhibit complex firing patterns consisting of tonic single-spikes and phasic bursts that encode information for certain types of reward-related learning and behavior. Non-linear dynamical analysis has previously demonstrated the presence of a non-linear deterministic structure in complex firing patterns of DA neurons, yet the origin of this non-linear determinism remains unknown. In this study, we hypothesized that bursting activity is the primary source of non-linear determinism in the firing patterns of DA neurons. To test this hypothesis, we investigated the dimension complexity of inter-spike interval data recorded in vivo from bursting and non-bursting DA neurons in the chloral hydrate-anesthetized rat substantia nigra. We found that bursting DA neurons exhibited non-linear determinism in their firing patterns, whereas non-bursting DA neurons showed truly stochastic firing patterns. Determinism was also detected in the isolated burst and inter-burst interval data extracted from firing patterns of bursting neurons. Moreover, less bursting DA neurons in halothane-anesthetized rats exhibited higher dimensional spiking dynamics than do more bursting DA neurons in chloral hydrate-anesthetized rats. These results strongly indicate that bursting activity is the main source of low-dimensional, non-linear determinism in the firing patterns of DA neurons. This finding furthermore suggests that bursts are the likely carriers of meaningful information in the firing activities of DA neurons. PMID:22831464

Determination of Survivable Fires

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Dietrich, D. L.; Niehaus, J. E.; Ruff, G. A.; Urban, D. L.; Takahashi, F.; Easton, J. W.; Abbott, A. A.; Graf, J. C.

2012-01-01

At NASA, there exists no standardized design or testing protocol for spacecraft fire suppression systems (either handheld or total flooding designs). An extinguisher's efficacy in safely suppressing any reasonable or conceivable fire is the primary benchmark. That concept, however, leads to the question of what a reasonable or conceivable fire is. While there exists the temptation to over-size' the fire extinguisher, weight and volume considerations on spacecraft will always (justifiably) push for the minimum size extinguisher required. This paper attempts to address the question of extinguisher size by examining how large a fire a crew member could successfully survive and extinguish in the confines of a spacecraft. The hazards to the crew and equipment during an accidental fire include excessive pressure rise resulting in a catastrophic rupture of the vehicle skin, excessive temperatures that burn or incapacitate the crew (due to hyperthermia), carbon dioxide build-up or other accumulation of other combustion products (e.g. carbon monoxide). Estimates of these quantities are determined as a function of fire size and mass of material burned. This then becomes the basis for determining the maximum size of a target fire for future fire extinguisher testing.

Fire extinguishment in hypobaric and hyperbaric environments

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Kimzey, J. H.

1971-01-01

Work that has been performed to provide information on the effects of various fire extinguishing agents in special atmospheres is discussed. Data used in the development of both equipment and techniques for manned spacecraft and related equipment are discussed. The equipment includes a hypobaric chamber suitable for low pressure use and a hyperbaric chamber for high pressure operation. The effectiveness of agents in weightless environment is also discussed.

Wildfire in the Pacific West: a brief history and implications for the future

Treesearch

James K. Agee

1989-01-01

Wildfire has been for millennia a natural component of our western forested wildlands. Its frequency, severity, and effects have varied depending on the specific environment, the type of fire, and the adaptations of the forest biota to fire. The socio-political environment in which these forests exist has had a much more significant impact on public and private policy...

Field determination of biomass burning emission ratios and factors via open-path FTIR spectroscopy and fire radiative power assessment: headfire, backfire and residual smouldering combustion in African savannahs

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wooster, M. J.; Freeborn, P. H.; Archibald, S.; Oppenheimer, C.; Roberts, G. J.; Smith, T. E. L.; Govender, N.; Burton, M.; Palumbo, I.

2011-11-01

Biomass burning emissions factors are vital to quantifying trace gas release from vegetation fires. Here we evaluate emissions factors for a series of savannah fires in Kruger National Park (KNP), South Africa using ground-based open path Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy and an IR source separated by 150-250 m distance. Molecular abundances along the extended open path are retrieved using a spectral forward model coupled to a non-linear least squares fitting approach. We demonstrate derivation of trace gas column amounts for horizontal paths transecting the width of the advected plume, and find for example that CO mixing ratio changes of ~0.01 μmol mol-1 [10 ppbv] can be detected across the relatively long optical paths used here. Though FTIR spectroscopy can detect dozens of different chemical species present in vegetation fire smoke, we focus our analysis on five key combustion products released preferentially during the pyrolysis (CH2O), flaming (CO2) and smoldering (CO, CH4, NH3) processes. We demonstrate that well constrained emissions ratios for these gases to both CO2 and CO can be derived for the backfire, headfire and residual smouldering combustion (RSC) stages of these savannah fires, from which stage-specific emission factors can then be calculated. Headfires and backfires often show similar emission ratios and emission factors, but those of the RSC stage can differ substantially. The timing of each fire stage was identified via airborne optical and thermal IR imagery and ground-observer reports, with the airborne IR imagery also used to derive estimates of fire radiative energy (FRE), allowing the relative amount of fuel burned in each stage to be calculated and "fire averaged" emission ratios and emission factors to be determined. These "fire averaged" metrics are dominated by the headfire contribution, since the FRE data indicate that the vast majority of the fuel is burned in this stage. Our fire averaged emission ratios and factors for CO2 and CH4 agree well with those from prior studies conducted in the same area using e.g. airborne plume sampling. We also concur with past suggestions that emission factors for formaldehyde in this environment appear substantially underestimated in widely used databases, but see no evidence to support suggestions by Sinha et al. (2003) of a major overestimation in the emission factor of ammonia in works such as Andreae and Merlet (2001) and Akagi et al. (2011). We also measure somewhat higher CO and NH3 emission ratios and factors than are usually reported for this environment, which is interpreted to result from the OP-FTIR ground-based technique sampling a greater proportion of smoke from smouldering processes than is generally the case with methods such as airborne sampling. Finally, our results suggest that the contribution of burning animal (elephant) dung can be a significant factor in the emissions characteristics of certain KNP fires, and that the ability of remotely sensed fire temperatures to provide information useful in tailoring modified combustion efficiency (MCE) and emissions factor estimates maybe rather limited, at least until the generally available precision of such temperature estimates can be substantially improved. One limitation of the OP-FTIR method is its ability to sample only near-ground level smoke, which may limit application at more intense fires where the majority of smoke is released into a vertically rising convection column. Nevertheless, even in such cases the method potentially enables a much better assessment of the emissions contribution of the RSC stage than is typically conducted currently.

Irradiated ignition of solid materials in reduced pressure atmosphere with various oxygen concentrations for fire safety in space habitats

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Nakamura, Y.; Aoki, A.

Effects of sub-atmospheric ambient pressure and oxygen content on irradiated ignition characteristics of solid combustibles were examined experimentally in order to elucidate the flammability and chance of fire in depressurized systems and give ideas for the fire safety and fire fighting strategies for such environments. Thin cellulosic paper was used as the solid combustible since cellulose is one of major organic compounds and flammables in the nature. Applied atmospheres consisted of inert gases (either CO 2 or N 2) and oxygen at various mixture ratios. Total ambient pressure ( P) was varied from 101 kPa (standard atmospheric pressure, P0) to 20 kPa. Ignition was initiated by external thermal radiation with CO 2 laser (10 W total; 21.3 W/cm 2 of the corresponding peak flux) onto the solid surface. Thermal degradation of the solid produced combustible gaseous products (e.g. CO, H 2, or other low weight of HCs) and these products mixed with ambient oxygen to form the combustible mixture over the solid. Heat transfer from the irradiated surface into the mixture accelerated the exothermic reaction in the gas phase and finally thermal runaway (ignition) was achieved. A digital video camera was used to analyze the ignition characteristics. Flammability maps in partial pressure of oxygen (ppO 2) and normalized ambient pressure ( P/ P0) plane were made to reveal the fire hazard in depressurized environments. Results showed that a wider flammable range was obtained in sub-atmospherics conditions. In middle pressure range (101-40 kPa), the required ppO 2 for ignition decreased almost linearly as the total pressure decreased, indicating that higher fire risk is expected. In lower pressure range (<40 kPa), the required partial pressure of oxygen increased dramatically, then ignition was eventually not achieved at pressures less than 20 kPa under the conditions studied here. The findings suggest that it might be difficult to satisfy safety in space agriculture since it has been reported that higher oxygen concentrations are preferable for plant growth in depressurized environments. Our results imply that there is an optimum pressure level to achieve less fire chance with acceptable plant growth. An increase of the flammable range in middle pressure level might be explained by following two effects: one is a physical effect, such as a weak convective thermal removal from ignitable domain (near the hot surface) to the ambient of atmosphere, and the other is chemical effect which causes so-called "explosion peninsula" as a result of depleting radical consumption due to third-body recombination reaction. Further studies are necessary to determine the controlling factor on the observed flammable trend in depressurized conditions.

44 CFR 204.24 - Determination on request for a fire management assistance declaration.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-10-01

... ASSISTANCE GRANT PROGRAM Declaration Process § 204.24 Determination on request for a fire management... 44 Emergency Management and Assistance 1 2014-10-01 2014-10-01 false Determination on request for a fire management assistance declaration. 204.24 Section 204.24 Emergency Management and Assistance...

44 CFR 204.24 - Determination on request for a fire management assistance declaration.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-10-01

... ASSISTANCE GRANT PROGRAM Declaration Process § 204.24 Determination on request for a fire management... 44 Emergency Management and Assistance 1 2012-10-01 2011-10-01 true Determination on request for a fire management assistance declaration. 204.24 Section 204.24 Emergency Management and Assistance...

44 CFR 204.24 - Determination on request for a fire management assistance declaration.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-10-01

... ASSISTANCE GRANT PROGRAM Declaration Process § 204.24 Determination on request for a fire management... 44 Emergency Management and Assistance 1 2013-10-01 2013-10-01 false Determination on request for a fire management assistance declaration. 204.24 Section 204.24 Emergency Management and Assistance...

44 CFR 204.24 - Determination on request for a fire management assistance declaration.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-10-01

... ASSISTANCE GRANT PROGRAM Declaration Process § 204.24 Determination on request for a fire management... 44 Emergency Management and Assistance 1 2011-10-01 2011-10-01 false Determination on request for a fire management assistance declaration. 204.24 Section 204.24 Emergency Management and Assistance...

Brazil Fire Characterization and Burn Area Estimation Using the Airborne Infrared Disaster Assessment (AIRDAS) System

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Brass, J. A.; Riggan, P. J.; Ambrosia, V. G.; Lockwood, R. N.; Pereira, J. A.; Higgins, R. G.; Peterson, David L. (Technical Monitor)

1995-01-01

Remotely sensed estimations of regional and global emissions from biomass combustion have been used to characterize fire behavior, determine fire intensity, and estimate burn area. Highly temporal, low resolution satellite data have been used to calculate estimates of fire numbers and area burned. These estimates of fire activity and burned area have differed dramatically, resulting in a wide range of predictions on the ecological and environmental impacts of fires. As part of the Brazil/United States Fire Initiative, an aircraft campaign was initiated in 1992 and continued in 1994. This multi-aircraft campaign was designed to assist in the characterization of fire activity, document fire intensity and determine area burned over prescribed, agricultural and wildland fires in the savanna and forests of central Brazil. Using a unique, multispectral scanner (AIRDAS), designed specifically for fire characterization, a variety of fires and burned areas were flown with a high spatial and high thermal resolution scanner. The system was used to measure flame front size, rate of spread, ratio of smoldering to flaming fronts and fire intensity. In addition, long transects were flown to determine the size of burned areas within the cerrado and transitional ecosystems. The authors anticipate that the fire activity and burned area estimates reported here will lead to enhanced information for precise regional trace gas prediction.

Some relevant parameters for assessing fire hazards of combustible mine materials using laboratory scale experiments

PubMed Central

Litton, Charles D.; Perera, Inoka E.; Harteis, Samuel P.; Teacoach, Kara A.; DeRosa, Maria I.; Thomas, Richard A.; Smith, Alex C.

2018-01-01

When combustible materials ignite and burn, the potential for fire growth and flame spread represents an obvious hazard, but during these processes of ignition and flaming, other life hazards present themselves and should be included to ensure an effective overall analysis of the relevant fire hazards. In particular, the gases and smoke produced both during the smoldering stages of fires leading to ignition and during the advanced flaming stages of a developing fire serve to contaminate the surrounding atmosphere, potentially producing elevated levels of toxicity and high levels of smoke obscuration that render the environment untenable. In underground mines, these hazards may be exacerbated by the existing forced ventilation that can carry the gases and smoke to locations far-removed from the fire location. Clearly, materials that require high temperatures (above 1400 K) and that exhibit low mass loss during thermal decomposition, or that require high heat fluxes or heat transfer rates to ignite represent less of a hazard than materials that decompose at low temperatures or ignite at low levels of heat flux. In order to define and quantify some possible parameters that can be used to assess these hazards, small-scale laboratory experiments were conducted in a number of configurations to measure: 1) the toxic gases and smoke produced both during non-flaming and flaming combustion; 2) mass loss rates as a function of temperature to determine ease of thermal decomposition; and 3) mass loss rates and times to ignition as a function of incident heat flux. This paper describes the experiments that were conducted, their results, and the development of a set of parameters that could possibly be used to assess the overall fire hazard of combustible materials using small scale laboratory experiments. PMID:29599565

Some relevant parameters for assessing fire hazards of combustible mine materials using laboratory scale experiments.

PubMed

Litton, Charles D; Perera, Inoka E; Harteis, Samuel P; Teacoach, Kara A; DeRosa, Maria I; Thomas, Richard A; Smith, Alex C

2018-04-15

When combustible materials ignite and burn, the potential for fire growth and flame spread represents an obvious hazard, but during these processes of ignition and flaming, other life hazards present themselves and should be included to ensure an effective overall analysis of the relevant fire hazards. In particular, the gases and smoke produced both during the smoldering stages of fires leading to ignition and during the advanced flaming stages of a developing fire serve to contaminate the surrounding atmosphere, potentially producing elevated levels of toxicity and high levels of smoke obscuration that render the environment untenable. In underground mines, these hazards may be exacerbated by the existing forced ventilation that can carry the gases and smoke to locations far-removed from the fire location. Clearly, materials that require high temperatures (above 1400 K) and that exhibit low mass loss during thermal decomposition, or that require high heat fluxes or heat transfer rates to ignite represent less of a hazard than materials that decompose at low temperatures or ignite at low levels of heat flux. In order to define and quantify some possible parameters that can be used to assess these hazards, small-scale laboratory experiments were conducted in a number of configurations to measure: 1) the toxic gases and smoke produced both during non-flaming and flaming combustion; 2) mass loss rates as a function of temperature to determine ease of thermal decomposition; and 3) mass loss rates and times to ignition as a function of incident heat flux. This paper describes the experiments that were conducted, their results, and the development of a set of parameters that could possibly be used to assess the overall fire hazard of combustible materials using small scale laboratory experiments.

Development of a Minimum Performance Standard for Hand-Held Fire Extinguishers as a Replacement for Halon 1211 on Civilian Transport Category Aircraft

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Webster, Harry

2002-08-01

One or more Halon 1211 hand-held fire extinguishers are specified in Federal Aviation Regulation (FAR) Part 25.851 as a requirement on transport category aircraft with 31 or more seats. Halon 1211 has been linked to the destruction of the ozone layer and production of new Halon 1211 has been halted per the Montreal Protocol in 1993. The phase out of Halon 1211, as the hand-held firefighting agent of choice, for civilian transport category aircraft has necessitated the development of a Minimum Performance Standard (MPS) to evaluate replacement agents. The purpose of the MPS is to insure that there is no reduction in safety, both in terms of effectiveness in fighting onboard fires and toxicity to the passengers and crew. The MPS specifies two new tests that replacement agents must pass in addition to requiring national certifications such as provided by Underwriters Laboratories. The first test evaluates the "flooding" characteristics of the agent against a hidden in-flight fire. This test determines the ability of a streaming agent to function as a flooding agent. The second test evaluates the performance of the agent in fighting a terrorist fire scenario and the associated toxicity hazard. This test measures the agent's ability to extinguish a triple-seat fire in an aircraft cabin under in-flight conditions and the toxicity characteristics of both the neat agent and the products of decomposition. This MPS will insure that the replacement agents will meet or exceed the performance of Halon 1211 both in fighting fires and maintaining a safe breathing environment in aircraft cabins.

Factors in adoption of a fire department wellness program: champ-and-chief model.

PubMed

Kuehl, Hannah; Mabry, Linda; Elliot, Diane L; Kuehl, Kerry S; Favorite, Kim C

2013-04-01

To identify and evaluate determinants of fire departments' wellness program adoption. The Promoting Healthy Lifestyles: Alternative Models' Effects fire service wellness program was offered for free to all medium-sized fire departments in Oregon and Washington. An invitation to participate was mailed to key fire department decision makers (chief, union president, and wellness officer). These key decision makers from 12 sites that adopted the program and 24 matched nonadopting sites were interviewed and results were analyzed to define adoption determinants. Three adoption requirements were identified: (1) mailer connection, (2) local firefighter wellness champion, and (3) willing fire chief, whereas a fourth set of organizational factors had little or no impact on adoption including previous and ongoing wellness activities, financial pressures, and resistance to change. Findings identified determinants of medium-sized fire service wellness program adoption.

Fire Safety in the Low-Gravity Spacecraft Environment

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Friedman, Robert

1999-01-01

Research in microgravity (low-gravity) combustion promises innovations and improvements in fire prevention and response for human-crew spacecraft. Findings indicate that material flammability and fire spread in microgravity are significantly affected by atmospheric flow rate, oxygen concentration, and diluent composition. This information can lead to modifications and correlations to standard material-assessment tests for prediction of fire resistance in space. Research on smoke-particle changes in microgravity promises future improvements and increased sensitivity of smoke detectors in spacecraft. Research on fire suppression by extinguishing agents and venting can yield new information on effective control of the rare, but serious fire events in spacecraft.

Relation between inflammables and ignition sources in aircraft environments

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Scull, Wilfred E

1951-01-01

A literature survey was conducted to determine the relation between aircraft ignition sources and inflammables. Available literature applicable to the problem of aircraft fire hazards is analyzed and discussed. Data pertaining to the effect of many variables on ignition temperatures, minimum ignition pressures, minimum spark-ignition energies of inflammables, quenching distances of electrode configurations, and size of openings through which flame will not propagate are presented and discussed. Ignition temperatures and limits of inflammability of gasoline in air in different test environments, and the minimum ignition pressures and minimum size of opening for flame propagation in gasoline-air mixtures are included; inerting of gasoline-air mixtures is discussed.

Civic Ecology Education and Resilient Societies: A Survey of Forest Fires in Greece

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Papaspiliou, Konstantina; Skanavis, Constantina; Giannoulis, Christos

2014-01-01

Forest fires, as all natural disasters, have the potential to seriously affect both the environment and the social structure of a local community. Unlike some of the natural disasters, such as hurricanes, tornados and tsunamis which are unpredictable, the phenomenon of forest fires could be easily predicted and controlled, since the causes are…

Manitoba Health's emerging work on wildland fire smoke

Treesearch

Jeffrey Joaquin; Darlene Oshanski

2015-01-01

Smoke caused by wildland fire events is an important public health issue, involving major risks to the health of people and the environment. Smoke from wildland fires can travel hundreds of kilometers, affecting air quality far from the flames. Through a partnership with Health Canada, Manitoba Health's Office of Disaster Management (ODM) has undertaken a number...

Defining old growth for fire-adapted forests of the Western United States

Treesearch

Merrill R. Kaufmann; Daniel Binkley; Peter Z. Fule; Johnson Marlin; Scott L. Stephens; Thomas W. Swetnam

2007-01-01

There are varying definitions of old-growth forests because of differences in environment and differing fire influence across the Intermountain West. Two general types of forests reflect the role of fire: 1) forests shaped by natural changes in structure and species makeup-plant succession-that are driven by competitive differences among species and individual trees...

Influence of climate and environment on post-fire recovery of mountain big sagebrush

Treesearch

Zachary J. Nelson; Peter J. Weisberg; Stanley G. Kitchen

2014-01-01

In arid and semi-arid landscapes around the world, wildfire plays a key role in maintaining species diversity. Dominant plant associations may depend upon particular fire regime characteristics for their persistence. Mountain shrub communities in high-elevation landscapes of the Intermountain West, USA, are strongly influenced by the post-fire recovery dynamics of the...

Measurements of convective and radiative heating in wildland fires

Treesearch

David Frankman; Brent W. Webb; Bret W. Butler; Daniel Jimenez; Jason M. Forthofer; Paul Sopko; Kyle S. Shannon; J. Kevin Hiers; Roger D. Ottmar

2012-01-01

Time-resolved irradiance and convective heating and cooling of fast-response thermopile sensors were measured in 13 natural and prescribed wildland fires under a variety of fuel and ambient conditions. It was shown that a sensor exposed to the fire environment was subject to rapid fluctuations of convective transfer whereas irradiance measured by a windowed sensor was...

Ignition and flame travel on realistic building and landscape objects in changing environments

Treesearch

Mark A. Dietenberger

2007-01-01

Effective mitigation of external fires on structures can be achieved flexibly, economically, and aesthetically by (1) preventing large-area ignition on structures from close proximity of burning vegetations and (2) stopping flame travel from firebrands landing on combustible building objects. In using bench-scale and mid-scale fire tests to obtain fire growth...

Relationships between fire frequency and woody canopy cover in a semi-arid African savanna

Treesearch

Andrew T. Hudak; Bruce H. Brockett

2003-01-01

Landscape-scale fire patterns result from complex interactions among weather, ignition sources, vegetation type and the biophysical environment (Hargrove et al. 2000, Morgan et al. 2001, Keane et al. 2002, Hudak, Fairbanks & Brockett in press). Patch characteristics (e.g. woody canopy cover) influence fire characteristics, which in turn influence patch...

Emissions measurements from vegetation fires: A comparative evaluation of methods and results

Treesearch

D. E. Ward; L. F. Radke

1993-01-01

Fires in the open environment produce a diversity of combustion products. Special techniques are needed to characterize the emissions ranging from microcombustion-evolved gas analysis to airborne monitoring of the full-scale phenomenon. This chapter discusses the advantages and disadvantages of each, the use of data in models for full-scale fires, and provides a...

Ethnoecology of Fire: An Experimental Approach in the Ohio Valley

Treesearch

Erin B. Hines; Jan Salick; Elaine Kennedy Sutherland; Todd F. Hutchinson; Steve Sutherland; Steve Sutherland

2000-01-01

Native Americans used fire to manipulate nature and directly benefit their survival. Certain plant species, many of which were useful to Native Americans as sources of food, fiber, dye, medicine, and game browse, are adapted to survive and even thrive in post-burn environments. Evidence suggests that Native Americans intentionally set fires to encourage growth and...

Quantifying Fire Impact on Alaskan Tundra from Satellite Observations and Field Measurements

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Loboda, T. V.; Chen, D.; He, J.; Jenkins, L. K.

2017-12-01

Wildfire is a major disturbance agent in Alaskan tundra. The frequency and extent of fire events obtained from paleo, management, and satellite records may yet underestimate the scope of tundra fire impact. Field measurements, collected within the NASA's ABoVE campaign, revealed unexpectedly shallow organic soils ( 15 cm) across all sampled sites of the Noatak valley with no significant difference between recently burned and unburned sites. In typical small and medium-sized tundra burns vegetation recovers rapidly and scars are not discernable in 30 m optical satellite imagery by the end of the first post-fire season. However, field observations indicate that vegetation and subsurface characteristics within fire scars of different ages vary across the landscape. In this study we develop linkages between fire-induced changes to tundra and satellite-based observations from optical, thermal, and microwave imagers to enable extrapolation of in-situ observations to cover the full extent of Alaskan tundra. Our results show that recent ( 30 years) fire history can be reconstructed from optical observations (R2 0.65, p<0.001) within a specific narrow temporal window or thermal signatures (R2 0.54, p < 0.001), in both cases controlled for slope and southern exposure. Using microwave SAR imagery fire history can be determined for 4 years post fire primarily due to increased soil moisture at burned sites. Field measurements suggest that the relatively quick SAR signal dissipation results from more even distribution of surface moisture through the soil column with increases in Active Layer Thickness (ALT). Similar to previous long-term field studies we find an increase in shrub fraction and shrub height within burns over time at the landscape scale; however, the strength and significance of the relationship between shrub fraction and time since fire is governed by burn severity with more severe burns predictably (p < 0.01) resulting in higher post-fire shrub cover. Although reasonably well-correlated to each other when adjusted for topography (R2 0.35, p < 0.001), neither ALT nor soil temperature can be directly linked to optical or thermal brightness observations with acceptable statistical significance, necessitating a more complex modeling environment for wall-to-wall mapping of subsurface parameters.

Production and efficiency of large wildland fire suppression effort: A stochastic frontier analysis.

PubMed

Katuwal, Hari; Calkin, David E; Hand, Michael S

2016-01-15

This study examines the production and efficiency of wildland fire suppression effort. We estimate the effectiveness of suppression resource inputs to produce controlled fire lines that contain large wildland fires using stochastic frontier analysis. Determinants of inefficiency are identified and the effects of these determinants on the daily production of controlled fire line are examined. Results indicate that the use of bulldozers and fire engines increase the production of controlled fire line, while firefighter crews do not tend to contribute to controlled fire line production. Production of controlled fire line is more efficient if it occurs along natural or built breaks, such as rivers and roads, and within areas previously burned by wildfires. However, results also indicate that productivity and efficiency of the controlled fire line are sensitive to weather, landscape and fire characteristics. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Warning signals for eruptive events in spreading fires

PubMed Central

Fox, Jerome M.; Whitesides, George M.

2015-01-01

Spreading fires are noisy (and potentially chaotic) systems in which transitions in dynamics are notoriously difficult to predict. As flames move through spatially heterogeneous environments, sudden shifts in temperature, wind, or topography can generate combustion instabilities, or trigger self-stabilizing feedback loops, that dramatically amplify the intensities and rates with which fires propagate. Such transitions are rarely captured by predictive models of fire behavior and, thus, complicate efforts in fire suppression. This paper describes a simple, remarkably instructive physical model for examining the eruption of small flames into intense, rapidly moving flames stabilized by feedback between wind and fire (i.e., “wind–fire coupling”—a mechanism of feedback particularly relevant to forest fires), and it presents evidence that characteristic patterns in the dynamics of spreading flames indicate when such transitions are likely to occur. In this model system, flames propagate along strips of nitrocellulose with one of two possible modes of propagation: a slow, structured mode, and a fast, unstructured mode sustained by wind–fire coupling. Experimental examination of patterns in dynamics that emerge near bifurcation points suggests that symptoms of critical slowing down (i.e., the slowed recovery of the system from perturbations as it approaches tipping points) warn of impending transitions to the unstructured mode. Findings suggest that slowing responses of spreading flames to sudden changes in environment (e.g., wind, terrain, temperature) may anticipate the onset of intense, feedback-stabilized modes of propagation (e.g., “blowup fires” in forests). PMID:25675491

Theta phase precession of grid and place cell firing in open environments

PubMed Central

Jeewajee, A.; Barry, C.; Douchamps, V.; Manson, D.; Lever, C.; Burgess, N.

2014-01-01

Place and grid cells in the rodent hippocampal formation tend to fire spikes at successively earlier phases relative to the local field potential theta rhythm as the animal runs through the cell's firing field on a linear track. However, this ‘phase precession’ effect is less well characterized during foraging in two-dimensional open field environments. Here, we mapped runs through the firing fields onto a unit circle to pool data from multiple runs. We asked which of seven behavioural and physiological variables show the best circular–linear correlation with the theta phase of spikes from place cells in hippocampal area CA1 and from grid cells from superficial layers of medial entorhinal cortex. The best correlate was the distance to the firing field peak projected onto the animal's current running direction. This was significantly stronger than other correlates, such as instantaneous firing rate and time-in-field, but similar in strength to correlates with other measures of distance travelled through the firing field. Phase precession was stronger in place cells than grid cells overall, and robust phase precession was seen in traversals through firing field peripheries (although somewhat less than in traversals through the centre), consistent with phase coding of displacement along the current direction. This type of phase coding, of place field distance ahead of or behind the animal, may be useful for allowing calculation of goal directions during navigation. PMID:24366140

The impact of fire on the geochemistry of speleothem-forming drip water in a sub-alpine cave.

PubMed

Coleborn, Katie; Baker, Andy; Treble, Pauline C; Andersen, Martin S; Baker, Andrew; Tadros, Carol V; Tozer, Mark; Fairchild, Ian J; Spate, Andy; Meehan, Sophia

2018-06-12

Fire dramatically modifies the surface environment by combusting vegetation and changing soil properties. Despite this well-documented impact on the surface environment, there has been limited research into the impact of fire events on karst, caves and speleothems. Here we report the first experiment designed to investigate the short-term impacts of a prescribed fire on speleothem-forming cave drip water geochemistry. Before and after the fire, water was collected on a bi-monthly basis from 18 drip sites in South Glory Cave, New South Wales, Australia. Two months post-fire, there was an increase in B, Si, Na, Fe and Pb concentrations at all drip sites. We conclude that this response is most likely due to the transport of soluble ash-derived elements from the surface to the cave drip water below. A significant deviation in stable water isotopic composition from the local meteoric water line was also observed at six of the sites. We hypothesise that this was due to partial evaporation of soil water resulting in isotopic enrichment of drip waters. Our results demonstrate that even low-severity prescribed fires can have an impact on speleothem-forming cave drip water geochemistry. These findings are significant because firstly, fires need to be considered when interpreting past climate from speleothem δ 18 O isotope and trace element records, particularly in fire prone regions such as Australia, North America, south west Europe, Russia and China. Secondly, it supports research that demonstrates speleothems could be potential proxy records for past fires. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Computational Pollutant Environment Assessment from Propulsion-System Testing

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Wang, Ten-See; McConnaughey, Paul; Chen, Yen-Sen; Warsi, Saif

1996-01-01

An asymptotic plume growth method based on a time-accurate three-dimensional computational fluid dynamics formulation has been developed to assess the exhaust-plume pollutant environment from a simulated RD-170 engine hot-fire test on the F1 Test Stand at Marshall Space Flight Center. Researchers have long known that rocket-engine hot firing has the potential for forming thermal nitric oxides, as well as producing carbon monoxide when hydrocarbon fuels are used. Because of the complex physics involved, most attempts to predict the pollutant emissions from ground-based engine testing have used simplified methods, which may grossly underpredict and/or overpredict the pollutant formations in a test environment. The objective of this work has been to develop a computational fluid dynamics-based methodology that replicates the underlying test-stand flow physics to accurately and efficiently assess pollutant emissions from ground-based rocket-engine testing. A nominal RD-170 engine hot-fire test was computed, and pertinent test-stand flow physics was captured. The predicted total emission rates compared reasonably well with those of the existing hydrocarbon engine hot-firing test data.

Applicability of Aerospace Materials Ground Flammability Test Data to Spacecraft Environments Theory and Applied Technologies

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hirsch, David; Williams, Jim; Beeson, Harold

2009-01-01

This slide presentation reviews the use of ground test data in reference to flammability to spacecraft environments. It reviews the current approach to spacecraft fire safety, the challenges to fire safety that the Constellation program poses, the current trends in the evaluation of the Constellation materials flammability, and the correlation of test data from ground flammability tests with the spacecraft environment. Included is a proposal for testing and the design of experiments to test the flammability of materials under similar spacecraft conditions.

Design and Implementation of a Smart Home System Using Multisensor Data Fusion Technology.

PubMed

Hsu, Yu-Liang; Chou, Po-Huan; Chang, Hsing-Cheng; Lin, Shyan-Lung; Yang, Shih-Chin; Su, Heng-Yi; Chang, Chih-Chien; Cheng, Yuan-Sheng; Kuo, Yu-Chen

2017-07-15

This paper aims to develop a multisensor data fusion technology-based smart home system by integrating wearable intelligent technology, artificial intelligence, and sensor fusion technology. We have developed the following three systems to create an intelligent smart home environment: (1) a wearable motion sensing device to be placed on residents' wrists and its corresponding 3D gesture recognition algorithm to implement a convenient automated household appliance control system; (2) a wearable motion sensing device mounted on a resident's feet and its indoor positioning algorithm to realize an effective indoor pedestrian navigation system for smart energy management; (3) a multisensor circuit module and an intelligent fire detection and alarm algorithm to realize a home safety and fire detection system. In addition, an intelligent monitoring interface is developed to provide in real-time information about the smart home system, such as environmental temperatures, CO concentrations, communicative environmental alarms, household appliance status, human motion signals, and the results of gesture recognition and indoor positioning. Furthermore, an experimental testbed for validating the effectiveness and feasibility of the smart home system was built and verified experimentally. The results showed that the 3D gesture recognition algorithm could achieve recognition rates for automated household appliance control of 92.0%, 94.8%, 95.3%, and 87.7% by the 2-fold cross-validation, 5-fold cross-validation, 10-fold cross-validation, and leave-one-subject-out cross-validation strategies. For indoor positioning and smart energy management, the distance accuracy and positioning accuracy were around 0.22% and 3.36% of the total traveled distance in the indoor environment. For home safety and fire detection, the classification rate achieved 98.81% accuracy for determining the conditions of the indoor living environment.

Design and Implementation of a Smart Home System Using Multisensor Data Fusion Technology

PubMed Central

Chou, Po-Huan; Chang, Hsing-Cheng; Lin, Shyan-Lung; Yang, Shih-Chin; Su, Heng-Yi; Chang, Chih-Chien; Cheng, Yuan-Sheng; Kuo, Yu-Chen

2017-01-01

This paper aims to develop a multisensor data fusion technology-based smart home system by integrating wearable intelligent technology, artificial intelligence, and sensor fusion technology. We have developed the following three systems to create an intelligent smart home environment: (1) a wearable motion sensing device to be placed on residents’ wrists and its corresponding 3D gesture recognition algorithm to implement a convenient automated household appliance control system; (2) a wearable motion sensing device mounted on a resident’s feet and its indoor positioning algorithm to realize an effective indoor pedestrian navigation system for smart energy management; (3) a multisensor circuit module and an intelligent fire detection and alarm algorithm to realize a home safety and fire detection system. In addition, an intelligent monitoring interface is developed to provide in real-time information about the smart home system, such as environmental temperatures, CO concentrations, communicative environmental alarms, household appliance status, human motion signals, and the results of gesture recognition and indoor positioning. Furthermore, an experimental testbed for validating the effectiveness and feasibility of the smart home system was built and verified experimentally. The results showed that the 3D gesture recognition algorithm could achieve recognition rates for automated household appliance control of 92.0%, 94.8%, 95.3%, and 87.7% by the 2-fold cross-validation, 5-fold cross-validation, 10-fold cross-validation, and leave-one-subject-out cross-validation strategies. For indoor positioning and smart energy management, the distance accuracy and positioning accuracy were around 0.22% and 3.36% of the total traveled distance in the indoor environment. For home safety and fire detection, the classification rate achieved 98.81% accuracy for determining the conditions of the indoor living environment. PMID:28714884

OR fire virtual training simulator: design and face validity.

PubMed

Dorozhkin, Denis; Olasky, Jaisa; Jones, Daniel B; Schwaitzberg, Steven D; Jones, Stephanie B; Cao, Caroline G L; Molina, Marcos; Henriques, Steven; Wang, Jinling; Flinn, Jeff; De, Suvranu

2017-09-01

The Virtual Electrosurgical Skill Trainer is a tool for training surgeons the safe operation of electrosurgery tools in both open and minimally invasive surgery. This training includes a dedicated team-training module that focuses on operating room (OR) fire prevention and response. The module was developed to allow trainees, practicing surgeons, anesthesiologist, and nurses to interact with a virtual OR environment, which includes anesthesia apparatus, electrosurgical equipment, a virtual patient, and a fire extinguisher. Wearing a head-mounted display, participants must correctly identify the "fire triangle" elements and then successfully contain an OR fire. Within these virtual reality scenarios, trainees learn to react appropriately to the simulated emergency. A study targeted at establishing the face validity of the virtual OR fire simulator was undertaken at the 2015 Society of American Gastrointestinal and Endoscopic Surgeons conference. Forty-nine subjects with varying experience participated in this Institutional Review Board-approved study. The subjects were asked to complete the OR fire training/prevention sequence in the VEST simulator. Subjects were then asked to answer a subjective preference questionnaire consisting of sixteen questions, focused on the usefulness and fidelity of the simulator. On a 5-point scale, 12 of 13 questions were rated at a mean of 3 or greater (92%). Five questions were rated above 4 (38%), particularly those focusing on the simulator effectiveness and its usefulness in OR fire safety training. A total of 33 of the 49 participants (67%) chose the virtual OR fire trainer over the traditional training methods such as a textbook or an animal model. Training for OR fire emergencies in fully immersive VR environments, such as the VEST trainer, may be the ideal training modality. The face validity of the OR fire training module of the VEST simulator was successfully established on many aspects of the simulation.

Monitoring the degradation of physical properties and fire hazards of high-impact polystyrene composite with different ageing time in natural environments.

PubMed

Wang, Bibo; Zhang, Yan; Tao, Youji; Zhou, Xia; Song, Lei; Jie, Ganxin; Hu, Yuan

2018-06-15

The current study aims at monitoring the role of the different natural environments on the physical properties and fire hazards of HIPS composites ageing in Turpan and Qionghai. The results indicated that the chromatic aberration and degradation of surface appearance intensified with the increasing ageing time. More flame retardants migrated and were eroded for HIPS composites ageing in Qionghai than those ageing in Turpan, which was caused by the combination of sunlight, high temperature and rainwater in Qionghai. After degradation in the natural environments, the HIPS composites possessed the lower thermal stability and char residues, more toxic gases release, higher peak heat release rate and fire hazard. For example, the peak heat release rate in Qionghai increased by 88.9%, which is much higher than that of in Turpan (55.6%). Moreover, the tensile strength and elongation at break decreased by 46% and 59% for HIPS composites ageing in Turpan and reduced by 53% and 67% for HIPS composites aged in Qionghai, respectively. The results demonstrate that more serious degradation of physical properties and higher fire hazard for HIPS composites ageing in Qionghai than those in Turpan due to the different natural ageing environments. Copyright © 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Bursting as a source of non-linear determinism in the firing patterns of nigral dopamine neurons.

PubMed

Jeong, Jaeseung; Shi, Wei-Xing; Hoffman, Ralph; Oh, Jihoon; Gore, John C; Bunney, Benjamin S; Peterson, Bradley S

2012-11-01

Nigral dopamine (DA) neurons in vivo exhibit complex firing patterns consisting of tonic single-spikes and phasic bursts that encode information for certain types of reward-related learning and behavior. Non-linear dynamical analysis has previously demonstrated the presence of a non-linear deterministic structure in complex firing patterns of DA neurons, yet the origin of this non-linear determinism remains unknown. In this study, we hypothesized that bursting activity is the primary source of non-linear determinism in the firing patterns of DA neurons. To test this hypothesis, we investigated the dimension complexity of inter-spike interval data recorded in vivo from bursting and non-bursting DA neurons in the chloral hydrate-anesthetized rat substantia nigra. We found that bursting DA neurons exhibited non-linear determinism in their firing patterns, whereas non-bursting DA neurons showed truly stochastic firing patterns. Determinism was also detected in the isolated burst and inter-burst interval data extracted from firing patterns of bursting neurons. Moreover, less bursting DA neurons in halothane-anesthetized rats exhibited higher dimensional spiking dynamics than do more bursting DA neurons in chloral hydrate-anesthetized rats. These results strongly indicate that bursting activity is the main source of low-dimensional, non-linear determinism in the firing patterns of DA neurons. This finding furthermore suggests that bursts are the likely carriers of meaningful information in the firing activities of DA neurons. © 2012 The Authors. European Journal of Neuroscience © 2012 Federation of European Neuroscience Societies and Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

Stochastic representation of fire behavior in a wildland fire protection planning model for California.

Treesearch

J. Keith Gilless; Jeremy S. Fried

1998-01-01

A fire behavior module was developed for the California Fire Economics Simulator version 2 (CFES2), a stochastic simulation model of initial attack on wildland fire used by the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. Fire rate of spread (ROS) and fire dispatch level (FDL) for simulated fires "occurring" on the same day are determined by making...

History of wildland fires on Vandenberg Air Force Base, California

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hickson, Diana E.

1988-01-01

The fire history of the past 50 years for Vandenberg AFB, California was determined using aerial photography, field investigation, and historical and current written records. This constitutes a record of the vegetation age classes for the entire base. The location, cause, and fuel type for sixty fires from this time period were determined. The fires were mapped and entered into a geographic infomation system (GIS) for Vandenberg. Fire history maps derived from this GIS were printed at 1:9600 scale and are on deposit at the Vandenberg Environmental Task Force Office. Although some ecologically significant plant communities on Vandenberg are adapted to fire, no natural fire frequency could be determined, since only one fire possibly caused by lightning occurred in the area now within the base since 1937. Observations made during this study suggest that burning may encourage the invasion of exotic species into chaparral, in particular Burton Mesa or sandhill chaparral, an unusual and geographically limited form of chaparral found on the base.

Climate drives inter-annual variability in probability of high severity fire occurrence in the western United States

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Keyser, Alisa; Westerling, Anthony LeRoy

2017-05-01

A long history of fire suppression in the western United States has significantly changed forest structure and ecological function, leading to increasingly uncharacteristic fires in terms of size and severity. Prior analyses of fire severity in California forests showed that time since last fire and fire weather conditions predicted fire severity very well, while a larger regional analysis showed that topography and climate were important predictors of high severity fire. There has not yet been a large-scale study that incorporates topography, vegetation and fire-year climate to determine regional scale high severity fire occurrence. We developed models to predict the probability of high severity fire occurrence for the western US. We predict high severity fire occurrence with some accuracy, and identify the relative importance of predictor classes in determining the probability of high severity fire. The inclusion of both vegetation and fire-year climate predictors was critical for model skill in identifying fires with high fractional fire severity. The inclusion of fire-year climate variables allows this model to forecast inter-annual variability in areas at future risk of high severity fire, beyond what slower-changing fuel conditions alone can accomplish. This allows for more targeted land management, including resource allocation for fuels reduction treatments to decrease the risk of high severity fire.

Analysis of thermal radiation in coal-fired furnaces

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Miles, Jonathan J.; Hammaker, Robert G.; Madding, Robert P.; Sunderland, J. E.

1997-04-01

Many utilities throughout the United States have added infrared scanning to their arsenal of techniques for inspection and predictive maintenance programs. Commercial infrared scanners are not designed, however, to withstand the searing interiors of boilers, which can exceed 2500 degrees Fahrenheit. Two high-temperature lenses designed to withstand the hostile environment inside a boiler for extended periods of time were developed by the EPRI M&D Center, thus permitting real-time measurement of steam tube temperatures and subsequent analysis of tube condition, inspection of burners, and identification of hot spots. A study was conducted by Sunderland Engineering, Inc. and EPRI M&D in order to characterize the radiative interactions that affect infrared measurements made inside a commercial, coal- fired, water-tube boiler. A comprehensive literature search exploring the existing record of results pertaining to analytical and experimental determination of radiative properties of coal-combustion byproducts was performed. An experimental component intended to provide data for characterization of the optical properties of hot combustion byproducts inside a coal-fired furnace was carried out. The results of the study indicate that hot gases, carbon particles, and fly ash, which together compose the medium inside a boiler, affect to varying degrees the transport of infrared radiation across a furnace. Techniques for improved infrared measurement across a coal-fired furnace are under development.

Screening of heavy metal containing waste types for use as raw material in Arctic clay-based bricks.

PubMed

Belmonte, Louise Josefine; Ottosen, Lisbeth M; Kirkelund, Gunvor Marie; Jensen, Pernille Erland; Vestbø, Andreas Peter

2016-11-10

In the vulnerable Arctic environment, the impact of especially hazardous wastes can have severe consequences and the reduction and safe handling of these waste types are therefore an important issue. In this study, two groups of heavy metal containing particulate waste materials, municipal solid waste incineration (MSWI) fly and bottom ashes and mine tailings (i.e., residues from the mineral resource industry) from Greenland were screened in order to determine their suitability as secondary resources in clay-based brick production. Small clay discs, containing 20 or 40% of the different particulate waste materials, were fired and material properties and heavy metal leaching tests were conducted before and after firing. Remediation techniques (washing in distilled water and electrodialytical treatment) applied to the fly ash reduced leaching before firing. The mine tailings and bottom ash brick discs obtained satisfactory densities (1669-2007 kg/m 3 ) and open porosities (27.9-39.9%). In contrast, the fly ash brick discs had low densities (1313-1578 kg/m 3 ) and high open porosities (42.1-51. %). However, leaching tests on crushed brick discs revealed that heavy metals generally became more available after firing for all the investigated materials and that further optimisation is therefore necessary prior to incorporation in bricks.

Social Networks and Adaptation to Environmental Change: The Case of Central Oregon's Fire-Prone Forest Landscape

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fischer, A.

2012-12-01

Social networks are the patterned interactions among individuals and organizations through which people refine their beliefs and values, negotiate meanings for things and develop behavioral intentions. The structure of social networks has bearing on how people communicate information, generate and retain knowledge, make decisions and act collectively. Thus, social network structure is important for how people perceive, shape and adapt to the environment. We investigated the relationship between social network structure and human adaptation to wildfire risk in the fire-prone forested landscape of Central Oregon. We conducted descriptive and non-parametric social network analysis on data gathered through interviews to 1) characterize the structure of the network of organizations involved in forest and wildfire issues and 2) determine whether network structure is associated with organizations' beliefs, values and behaviors regarding fire and forest management. Preliminary findings indicate that fire protection and forest-related organizations do not frequently communicate or cooperate, suggesting that opportunities for joint problem-solving, innovation and collective action are limited. Preliminary findings also suggest that organizations with diverse partners are more likely to hold adaptive beliefs about wildfire and work cooperatively. We discuss the implications of social network structure for adaptation to changing environmental conditions such as wildfire risk.

Estimating wildland fire rate of spread in a spatially nonuniform environment

Treesearch

Francis M Fujioka

1985-01-01

Estimating rate of fire spread is a key element in planning for effective fire control. Land managers use the Rothermel spread model, but the model assumptions are violated when fuel, weather, and topography are nonuniform. This paper compares three averaging techniques--arithmetic mean of spread rates, spread based on mean fuel conditions, and harmonic mean of spread...

Fire effects on infiltration rates after prescribed fire in northern Rocky Mountain forests, USA

Treesearch

Peter R. Robichaud

2000-01-01

Infiltration rates in undisturbed forest environments are generally high. These high infiltration rates may be reduced when forest management activities such as timber harvesting and/or prescribed fires are used. Post-harvest residue burning is a common site preparation treatment used in the Northern Rocky Mountains, USA, to reduce forest fuels and to prepare sites for...

The importance of traditional fire use and management practices for contemporary land managers in the American Southwest

Treesearch

Carol Raish; Armando Gonzalez-Caban; Carol J. Condie

2005-01-01

Indigenous and traditional peoples worldwide have used fire to manipulate their environment for thousands of years. These longstanding practices still continue and have considerable relevance for today’s land managers. This discussion explores the value of documenting and understanding historic and contemporary fire use attitudes and practices of the varied cultural/...

Response of reptile and amphibian communities to the reintroduction of fire in an oak/hickory forest

Treesearch

Steven J. Hromada; Christopher A.F. Howey; Matthew B. Dickinson; Roger W. Perry; Willem M. Roosenburg; C.M. Gienger

2018-01-01

Fire can have diverse effects on ecosystems, including direct effects through injury and mortality and indirect effects through changes to available resources within the environment. Changes in vegetation structure such as a decrease in canopy cover or an increase in herbaceous cover from prescribed fire can increase availability of preferred microhabitats for some...

On the relative role of fire and rainfall in determining vegetation patterns in tropical savannas: a simulation study

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Spessa, Allan; Fisher, Rosie

2010-05-01

Tropical savannas cover 18% of the world's land surface and are amongst the most productive terrestrial systems in the world. They comprise 15% of the total terrestrial carbon stock, with an estimated mean net primary productivity (NPP) of 7.2 tCha-1yr-1 or two thirds of NPP in tropical forests. Tropical savannas are the most frequently burnt biome, with fire return intervals in highly productive areas being typically 1-2 years. Fires shape vegetation species composition, tree to grass ratios and nutrient redistribution, as well as the biosphere-atmosphere exchange of trace gases, momentum and radiative energy. Tropical savannas are a major source of emissions, contributing 38 % of total annual CO2 from biomass burning, 30% CO, 19 % CH4 and 59 % NOx. Climatically, they occur in regions subject to a strongly seasonal ‘wet-dry' regime, usually under monsoonal control from the movement of the inter-tropical convergence zone. In general, rainfall during the prior wet season(s) determines the amount of grass fuel available for burning while the length of the dry season influences fuel moisture content. Rainfall in tropical savannas exhibits high inter-annual variability, and under future climate change, is projected to change significantly in much of Africa, South America and northern Australia. Process-based simulation models of fire-vegetation dynamics and feedbacks are critical for determining the impacts of wildfires under projected future climate change on i) ecosystem structure and function, and ii) emissions of trace gases and aerosols from biomass burning. A new mechanistic global fire model SPITFIRE (SPread and InTensity of FIRE) has been designed to overcome many of the limitations in existing fire models set within Dynamic Global Vegetation Models (DGVMs). SPITFIRE has been applied in coupled mode globally and southern Africa, both as part of the LPJ DGVM. It has also been driven with MODIS burnt area data applied to sub-Saharan Africa, while coupled to the LPJ-GUESS vegetation model. Recently, SPIFTIRE has been coupled to the Ecosystem Demography (ED) model, which simulates global vegetation dynamics as part of the new land surface scheme JULES (Joint UK Environment Simulator) within the QUEST Earth System Model (http://www.quest-esm.ac.uk/). This study forms part of on-going work to further improve and test the ability of JULES to accurately simulate the terrestrial carbon cycle and land-atmosphere exchanges under different climates. Using the JULES (ED-SPITFIRE) model driven by observed climate (1901-2002), and focusing on large-scale rainfall gradients in the tropical savannas of west Africa, the Northern Territory (Australia) and central-southern Brazil, this study assesses: i) simulated versus observed vegetation dynamics and distributions, and ii) the relative importance of fire versus rainfall in determining vegetation patterns. A sensitivity analysis approach was used.

Examination of Aircraft Interior Emergency Lighting in a Postcrash Fire Environment.

DTIC Science & Technology

1982-06-01

levels under realistic external fuel-fire conditions; (3) to compare black fuel-fire smoke with an enert white screen fog (references I and 2); (4... black smoke condition" at 52 seconds after the fuel fire was ignited and zero visibility a the 60-inch level at 120 seconds. Because it was closer to the...suitable stand was fabricated for each sign and the holes designed for aircraft mounting were utilized for securing the light to the stand. Two 28 AVG

Application of High Speed Digital Image Correlation in Rocket Engine Hot Fire Testing

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Gradl, Paul R.; Schmidt, Tim

2016-01-01

Hot fire testing of rocket engine components and rocket engine systems is a critical aspect of the development process to understand performance, reliability and system interactions. Ground testing provides the opportunity for highly instrumented development testing to validate analytical model predictions and determine necessary design changes and process improvements. To properly obtain discrete measurements for model validation, instrumentation must survive in the highly dynamic and extreme temperature application of hot fire testing. Digital Image Correlation has been investigated and being evaluated as a technique to augment traditional instrumentation during component and engine testing providing further data for additional performance improvements and cost savings. The feasibility of digital image correlation techniques were demonstrated in subscale and full scale hotfire testing. This incorporated a pair of high speed cameras to measure three-dimensional, real-time displacements and strains installed and operated under the extreme environments present on the test stand. The development process, setup and calibrations, data collection, hotfire test data collection and post-test analysis and results are presented in this paper.

The three Rs of fire safety, emergency action, and fire prevention planning: promoting safety at the worksite.

PubMed

Thompson, Marcella R

2003-04-01

Fire safety is of paramount importance for everyone. In many workplaces, the occupational health nurse's scope of practice encompasses safety related activities. Included within this role is the responsibility for fire safety, emergency action, and fire prevention planning. The Three Rs of fire safety, emergency action, and fire prevention plans are rules, responsibilities, and resources. Myriad building and fire safety codes, regulations, and standards exist with which an employer must comply. An employer's responsibility for installing, testing, inspecting, and maintaining fire safety related equipment is extensive. Emergency action and fire prevention planning begins with conducting a detailed physical survey and preparing site maps. It includes making key policy decisions, writing procedures, and training employees in those procedures by practicing and executing site drills. The best resources available for emergency planning are the local fire department and the property insurer. Planning ahead means an efficient emergency response if disaster strikes. It saves lives, limits property damage, and preserves the environment.

Modeling the impacts of wildfire on runoff and pollutant transport from coastal watersheds to the nearshore environment.

PubMed

Morrison, Katherine D; Kolden, Crystal A

2015-03-15

Wildfire is a common disturbance that can significantly alter vegetation in watersheds and affect the rate of sediment and nutrient transport to adjacent nearshore oceanic environments. Changes in runoff resulting from heterogeneous wildfire effects are not well-understood due to both limitations in the field measurement of runoff and temporally-limited spatial data available to parameterize runoff models. We apply replicable, scalable methods for modeling wildfire impacts on sediment and nonpoint source pollutant export into the nearshore environment, and assess relationships between wildfire severity and runoff. Nonpoint source pollutants were modeled using a GIS-based empirical deterministic model parameterized with multi-year land cover data to quantify fire-induced increases in transport to the nearshore environment. Results indicate post-fire concentration increases in phosphorus by 161 percent, sediments by 350 percent and total suspended solids (TSS) by 53 percent above pre-fire years. Higher wildfire severity was associated with the greater increase in exports of pollutants and sediment to the nearshore environment, primarily resulting from the conversion of forest and shrubland to grassland. This suggests that increasing wildfire severity with climate change will increase potential negative impacts to adjacent marine ecosystems. The approach used is replicable and can be utilized to assess the effects of other types of land cover change at landscape scales. It also provides a planning and prioritization framework for management activities associated with wildfire, including suppression, thinning, and post-fire rehabilitation, allowing for quantification of potential negative impacts to the nearshore environment in coastal basins. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Evaluation of mine fires due to spontaneous combustion in the mechanized faces of Middle Anatolian Lignite mine (OAL), case studies

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Gueyagueler, T.; Karaman, H.

1995-12-31

In this paper fires due to spontaneous combustion in Middle Anatolian Lignite mine (OAL) which is the first fully mechanized underground lignite mine in Turkey, are studied. Since the installation of mechanization, due to spontaneous heating, four panel fires namely, AO1, AO2, AO3 and AO4 have broken out. During these fires, the concentrations of carbon monoxide, methane and the velocity of air are measured continuously by the Micro Minos Environmental monitoring system. For each fire, the environment where fire has started is examined and the possible causes of the fire are investigated. Also the precautions taken to extinguish the firemore » at different stages are described and the importance of the early detection of mine fire are discussed together with the limitations of the monitoring system the practical difficulties observed during the fire.« less

Toxicological aspects of fire.

PubMed

Stefanidou, M; Athanaselis, S

2004-08-01

Most fatalities from fires are not due to burns, but are a result of inhalation of toxic gases produced during combustion. Fire produces a complex toxic environment, involving flame, heat, oxygen depletion, smoke and toxic gases. As a wide variety of synthetic materials is used in buildings (insulation, furniture, carpeting, electric wiring covering, decorative items), the potential for poisoning from inhalation of products of combustion is continuously increasing. In the present review, the problems that are present in a fire event, the toxicology of the toxic substances and the specific chemical hazards to firefighters are described. Regulatory toxicology aspects are presented concerning the use of non-flammable building and furnishing materials to prevent fires and decrease of poisonings and deaths resulting from fires.

Anthropogenic fire drives the evolution of seed traits

PubMed Central

Gómez-González, Susana; Torres-Díaz, Cristian; Bustos-Schindler, Carlos; Gianoli, Ernesto

2011-01-01

Fire is a major disturbance affecting ecosystems worldwide. Phylogenetic studies have shown that the evolution of seed persistence (fire resistance) is associated with fire frequency or severity. However, the existence of specific seed traits resulting from natural selection mediated by fire remains a key question in plant evolution. We evaluated the role of fire in the evolution of seed traits from a microevolutionary perspective, using as a study system a native forb from the Chilean matorral, where fire is a novel, anthropogenic disturbance. We show that anthropogenic fires are shaping the evolution of seed traits such as pubescence and shape. Among-population variation in seed pubescence, shape, and pericarp thickness was strongly associated with fire frequency, and within a population, fire selected those plants with more pubescent seeds, thicker pericarps, and less rounded seeds. Seed pubescence and shape were shown to be heritable traits. Our findings provide insights into the understanding of the evolution of seed traits in fire-prone environments and demonstrate that human-made fires can be driving evolutionary changes in plant species from ecosystems where fires do not occur naturally. PMID:22065739

Anthropogenic fire drives the evolution of seed traits.

PubMed

Gómez-González, Susana; Torres-Díaz, Cristian; Bustos-Schindler, Carlos; Gianoli, Ernesto

2011-11-15

Fire is a major disturbance affecting ecosystems worldwide. Phylogenetic studies have shown that the evolution of seed persistence (fire resistance) is associated with fire frequency or severity. However, the existence of specific seed traits resulting from natural selection mediated by fire remains a key question in plant evolution. We evaluated the role of fire in the evolution of seed traits from a microevolutionary perspective, using as a study system a native forb from the Chilean matorral, where fire is a novel, anthropogenic disturbance. We show that anthropogenic fires are shaping the evolution of seed traits such as pubescence and shape. Among-population variation in seed pubescence, shape, and pericarp thickness was strongly associated with fire frequency, and within a population, fire selected those plants with more pubescent seeds, thicker pericarps, and less rounded seeds. Seed pubescence and shape were shown to be heritable traits. Our findings provide insights into the understanding of the evolution of seed traits in fire-prone environments and demonstrate that human-made fires can be driving evolutionary changes in plant species from ecosystems where fires do not occur naturally.

Fire effects in northeastern forests: oak.

Treesearch

Cary Rouse

1986-01-01

Effects of fire on the oak timber type are reviewed. Many oak stands of today originated under severe fire regimes. Fire can ill or injure oak trees. Factors determining direct injury or mortality from fire include: season of year; bark characteristics; size, vigor and form of tree; fire characteristics and stocking level.

Firing rate dynamics in the hippocampus induced by trajectory learning.

PubMed

Ji, Daoyun; Wilson, Matthew A

2008-04-30

The hippocampus is essential for spatial navigation, which may involve sequential learning. However, how the hippocampus encodes new sequences in familiar environments is unknown. To study the impact of novel spatial sequences on the activity of hippocampal neurons, we monitored hippocampal ensembles while rats learned to switch from two familiar trajectories to a new one in a familiar environment. Here, we show that this novel spatial experience induces two types of changes in firing rates, but not locations of hippocampal place cells. First, place-cell firing rates on the two familiar trajectories start to change before the actual behavioral switch to the new trajectory. Second, repeated exposure on the new trajectory is associated with an increased dependence of place-cell firing rates on immediate past locations. The result suggests that sequence encoding in the hippocampus may involve integration of information about the recent past into current state.

Firing Rate Dynamics in the Hippocampus Induced by Trajectory Learning

PubMed Central

Wilson, Matthew A.

2008-01-01

The hippocampus is essential for spatial navigation, which may involve sequential learning. However, how the hippocampus encodes new sequences in familiar environments is unknown. To study the impact of novel spatial sequences on the activity of hippocampal neurons, we monitored hippocampal ensembles while rats learned to switch from two familiar trajectories to a new one in a familiar environment. Here, we show that this novel spatial experience induces two types of changes in firing rates, but not locations of hippocampal place cells. First, place-cell firing rates on the two familiar trajectories start to change before the actual behavioral switch to the new trajectory. Second, repeated exposure on the new trajectory is associated with an increased dependence of place-cell firing rates on immediate past locations. The result suggests that sequence encoding in the hippocampus may involve integration of information about the recent past into current state. PMID:18448645

Space Systems - Safety and Compatibility of Materials - Method to Determine the Flammability Thresholds of Materials

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hirsch, David

2009-01-01

Spacecraft fire safety emphasizes fire prevention, which is achieved primarily through the use of fire-resistant materials. Materials selection for spacecraft is based on conventional flammability acceptance tests, along with prescribed quantity limitations and configuration control for items that are non-pass or questionable. ISO 14624-1 and -2 are the major methods used to evaluate flammability of polymeric materials intended for use in the habitable environments of spacecraft. The methods are upward flame-propagation tests initiated in static environments and using a well-defined igniter flame at the bottom of the sample. The tests are conducted in the most severe flaming combustion environment expected in the spacecraft. The pass/fail test logic of ISO 14624-1 and -2 does not allow a quantitative comparison with reduced gravity or microgravity test results; therefore their use is limited, and possibilities for in-depth theoretical analyses and realistic estimates of spacecraft fire extinguishment requirements are practically eliminated. To better understand the applicability of laboratory test data to actual spacecraft environments, a modified ISO 14624 protocol has been proposed that, as an alternative to qualifying materials as pass/fail in the worst-expected environments, measures the actual upward flammability limit for the material. A working group established by NASA to provide recommendations for exploration spacecraft internal atmospheres realized the importance of correlating laboratory data with real-life environments and recommended NASA to develop a flammability threshold test method. The working group indicated that for the Constellation Program, the flammability threshold information will allow NASA to identify materials with increased flammability risk from oxygen concentration and total pressure changes, minimize potential impacts, and allow for development of sound requirements for new spacecraft and extravehicular landers and habitats. Furthermore, recent research has shown that current normal gravity materials flammability tests do not correlate with flammability in ventilated, micro- or reduced-gravity conditions. Currently, the materials selection for spacecraft is based on the assumption of commonality between ground flammability test results and spacecraft environments, which does not appear to be valid. Materials flammability threshold data acquired in normal gravity can be correlated with data obtained in microgravity or reduced-gravity experiments, and consequently a more accurate assessment of the margin of safety of the material in the real environment can be made. In addition, the method allows the option of selecting better or best space system materials, as opposed to what would be considered just acceptable from a flammability point of view and realistic assessment of spacecraft fire extinguishment needs, which could result in significant weight savings. The knowledge afforded by this technique allows for limited extrapolations of flammability behavior to conditions not specifically tested and that could potentially result in significant cost and time savings. The intent of this Technical Specification is to bring to the attention of International Aerospace Community the importance of correlating laboratory test data with real-life space systems applications. The method presented is just one of the possibilities that are believed will lead to better understanding the applicability of laboratory aerospace materials flammability test data. International feedback on improving the proposed method, as well as suggestions for correlating other laboratory aerospace test data with real-life applications relevant to space systems are being sought.

Preliminary results of fire behavior in maquis fuels under varying weather and slope conditions in turkey

Treesearch

Bulent Saglam; Ertugrul Bilgili; Omer Kucuk; Bahar Dinc Durmaz; Ismail Baysal

2007-01-01

The prediction of fire behavior is of vital importance to all fire management planning and decisionmaking processes including fire prevention, presuppression planning, and fire use. The effect of slope on fire behavior is well acknowledged, yet its effect on fire behavior is not well accounted for. Determining the effects of slope on fire behavior under field...

Enhancing Mental Models for Team Effectiveness

DTIC Science & Technology

2011-09-01

person teams. C3Fire, a simulation of forest firefighting, was used as the task environment. Each team was assigned to one of three learning...military, for a total of 27 two-person teams. C3Fire, a functional simulation of forest firefighting, was used as the task environment. The...processes. A more likely explanation for the non-significant findings is that the task and team learning conditions used in this study did not sufficiently

Modeling mechanisms of vegetation change due to fire in a semi-arid ecosystem

USGS Publications Warehouse

White, J.D.; Gutzwiller, K.J.; Barrow, W.C.; Randall, L.J.; Swint, P.

2008-01-01

Vegetation growth and community composition in semi-arid environments is determined by water availability and carbon assimilation mechanisms specific to different plant types. Disturbance also impacts vegetation productivity and composition dependent on area affected, intensity, and frequency factors. In this study, a new spatially explicit ecosystem model is presented for the purpose of simulating vegetation cover type changes associated with fire disturbance in the northern Chihuahuan Desert region. The model is called the Landscape and Fire Simulator (LAFS) and represents physiological activity of six functional plant types incorporating site climate, fire, and seed dispersal routines for individual grid cells. We applied this model for Big Bend National Park, Texas, by assessing the impact of wildfire on the trajectory of vegetation communities over time. The model was initialized and calibrated based on landcover maps derived from Landsat-5 Thematic Mapper data acquired in 1986 and 1999 coupled with plant biomass measurements collected in the field during 2000. Initial vegetation cover change analysis from satellite data showed shrub encroachment during this time period that was captured in the simulated results. A synthetic 50-year climate record was derived from historical meteorological data to assess system response based on initial landcover conditions. This simulation showed that shrublands increased to the detriment of grass and yucca-ocotillo vegetation cover types indicating an ecosystem-level trajectory for shrub encroachment. Our analysis of simulated fires also showed that fires significantly reduced site biomass components including leaf area, stem, and seed biomass in this semi-arid ecosystem. In contrast to other landscape simulation models, this new model incorporates detailed physiological responses of functional plant types that will allow us to simulated the impact of increased atmospheric CO2 occurring with climate change coupled with fire disturbance. Simulations generated from this model are expected to be the subject of subsequent studies on landscape dynamics with specific regard to prediction of wildlife distributions associated with fire management and climate change.

Bacterial and fungal growth for monitoring the impact of wildfire combined or not with different soil stabilization treatments

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Barreiro, Ana; Baath, Erland; Díaz-Raviña, Montserrat

2015-04-01

Soil stabilization techniques are rapidly gaining acceptance as efficient tool for reducing post-fire erosion. However, despite its interest, information concerning their impact on soil biota is scarce. We examined, under field conditions, the bacterial and fungal medium-term responses in a hillslope area located in Laza (NW Spain) affected by a high severity wildfire with the following treatments established by triplicate (4 x 20 m plots): unburnt control soil, burnt control soil, burnt soil with rye seeding and burnt soil with straw mulch. The bacterial and fungal growth, as well as respiration, were measured 4 years after fire and application of treatments using leucine incorporation for bacterial growth and acetate-in-ergosterol incorporation for fungal growth. The results showed that soil respiration and fungal biomass were negatively affected by fire, in the top layer (0-5 cm), while bacterial and fungal growth was stimulated. These microbial changes induced by fire were associated with modifications in organic matter (50% reduction in C content) and soil pH (increase of 0.5-0.9 units). Thus, the results suggested that under acid environment (pH in water 3.5) post-fire conditions might have favoured both microbial groups, which is supported by the fact that estimated bacterial and fungal growth were positive and significant correlated with soil pH (range of 3.5-4.5). This contrast with the well-known reported investigations showing that bacteria rather than fungi proliferation occurred after prescribed fire or wildfire; it should be noticed, however, that soils with a higher pH than that in the present study were used. Our data also indicated that bacterial and fungal communities were not significantly affected by seeding and mulching treatments. The results highlighted the importance of pre-fire soil pH as key factor in determining the microbial response after fire. Acknowledgements. A. Barreiro is recipient of FPU grant from Spanish Ministry of Education. Keywords: wildfire, seeding, mulching, bacterial growth, fungal growth

Impact of wildfire on levels of mercury in forested watershed systems - Voyageurs National Park, Minnesota

USGS Publications Warehouse

Woodruff, Laurel G.; Sandheinrich, Mark B.; Brigham, Mark E.; Cannon, William F.

2009-01-01

Atmospheric deposition of mercury to remote lakes in mid-continental and eastern North America has increased approximately threefold since the mid-1800s (Swain and others, 1992; Fitzgerald and others, 1998; Engstrom and others, 2007). As a result, concerns for human and wildlife health related to mercury contamination have become widespread. Despite an apparent recent decline in atmospheric deposition of mercury in many areas of the Upper Midwest (Engstrom and Swain, 1997; Engstrom and others, 2007), lakes in which fish contain levels of mercury deemed unacceptable for human consumption and possibly unacceptable for fish-consuming wildlife are being detected with increasing frequency. In northern Minnesota, Voyageurs National Park (VNP) (fig. 1) protects a series of southern boreal lakes and wetlands situated on bedrock of the Precambrian Canadian Shield. Mercury contamination has become a significant resource issue within VNP as high concentrations of mercury in loons, bald eagle eaglets, grebes, northern pike, and other species of wildlife and fish have been found. The two most mercury-contaminated lakes in Minnesota, measured as methylmercury in northern pike (Esox lucius), are in VNP. Recent multidisciplinary U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) research demonstrated that the bulk of the mercury in lake waters, soils, and fish in VNP results from atmospheric deposition (Wiener and others, 2006). The study by Wiener and others (2006) showed that the spatial distribution of mercury in watershed soils, lake waters, and age-1 yellow perch (Perca flavescens) within the Park was highly variable. The majority of factors correlated for this earlier study suggested that mercury concentrations in lake waters and age-1 yellow perch reflected the influence of ecosystem processes that affected within-lake microbial production and abundance of methylmercury (Wiener and others, 2006), while the distribution of mercury in watershed soils seemed to be partially dependent on forest disturbance, especially the historic forest fire pattern (Woodruff and Cannon, 2002). Forest fire has an essential role in the forest ecosystems of VNP (Heinselman, 1996). Because resource and land managers need to integrate both natural wildfire and prescribed fire in management plans, the potential influence of fire on an element as sensitive to the environment as mercury becomes a critical part of their decisionmaking. A number of recent studies have shown that while fire does have a significant impact on mercury at the landscape level, the observed effects of fire on aquatic environments are highly variable and unpredictable (Caldwell and others, 2000; Garcia and Carrigan, 2000; Kelly and others, 2006; Nelson and others, 2007). Caldwell and others (2000) described an increase in methylmercury in reservoir sediments resulting from mobilization and transport of charred vegetative matter following a fire in New Mexico. Krabbenhoft and Fink (2000) attributed increases in total mercury concentrations in young-of-the-year fish in the Florida Everglades to release of mercury resulting from peat oxidation following fires. A fivefold increase in whole-body mercury accumulation by rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) following a fire in Alberta, Canada, apparently resulted from increased nutrient concentrations that enhanced productivity and restructured the food web of a lake within the fire's burn footprint (Kelly and others, 2006). For this study, we determined the short-term effects of forest fire on mercury concentrations in terrestrial and aquatic environments in VNP by comparing and contrasting mercury concentrations in forest soils, lake waters, and age-1 yellow perch for a burned watershed and an adjacent lake, with similar samples from watersheds and lakes with no fire activity (control watersheds and lakes). The concentration of total mercury in whole, 1-year-old yellow perch serves as a good biological indicator for monitoring trends in methylmercury conce

Diagnostic developments for velocity and temperature measurements in uni-element rocket environments

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Philippart, Kenneth D.

1995-08-01

Velocity and temperature measurements were taken within a uni-element rocket combustion chamber for hydrogen-oxygen propellants using laser Doppler velocimetry, thermocouples, and a thermocouple-based temperature rake developed for this effort. Velocity and turbulence profiles were obtained for firings with a gaseous oxygen (GO2)/gaseous hydrogen (GH2) coaxial shear injector at axial locations of 1.6 mm (0.063 in.), 6.4 mm (0.25 in.), 12.7 mm (0.5 in.), 25.4 mm (1 in.) and 50.8 mm (2 in.). Aluminum oxide particles of various sizes seeded the flow in an attempt to explain the discrepancies. While cold-flow simulations were promising, hot-fire results for the various particles were virtually identical and still lower than earlier data. The hot-firings were self-consistent and question the reproducibility of the previous data. Velocity measurements were made closer to the injector than the preceding work. Asymmetries were noted in all profiles. The shear layer displayed high turbulence levels. The central flow near the injector resembled turbulent pipe flow. Recirculation zones existed at the chamber walls and became smaller as the flow evolved downstream. The combusting flow region expanded with increasing axial distance. A thermocouple-instrumented coaxial injector was fired with GO2/GH2 propellants. The injector exit plane boundary conditions were determined. The feasibility of a thermocouple-based temperature rake was established. Tests at three axial positions for air/GM2 firings revealed asymmetric profiles. Temperatures increased with increasing axial distance.

Phasic and tonic neuron ensemble codes for stimulus-environment conjunctions in the lateral entorhinal cortex.

PubMed

Pilkiw, Maryna; Insel, Nathan; Cui, Younghua; Finney, Caitlin; Morrissey, Mark D; Takehara-Nishiuchi, Kaori

2017-07-06

The lateral entorhinal cortex (LEC) is thought to bind sensory events with the environment where they took place. To compare the relative influence of transient events and temporally stable environmental stimuli on the firing of LEC cells, we recorded neuron spiking patterns in the region during blocks of a trace eyeblink conditioning paradigm performed in two environments and with different conditioning stimuli. Firing rates of some neurons were phasically selective for conditioned stimuli in a way that depended on which room the rat was in; nearly all neurons were tonically selective for environments in a way that depended on which stimuli had been presented in those environments. As rats moved from one environment to another, tonic neuron ensemble activity exhibited prospective information about the conditioned stimulus associated with the environment. Thus, the LEC formed phasic and tonic codes for event-environment associations, thereby accurately differentiating multiple experiences with overlapping features.

Predicting the formation and the dispersion of toxic combustion products from the fires of dangerous substances

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Nevrlý, V.; Bitala, P.; Danihelka, P.; Dobeš, P.; Dlabka, J.; Hejzlar, T.; Baudišová, B.; Míček, D.; Zelinger, Z.

2012-04-01

Natural events, such as wildfires, lightning or earthquakes represent a frequent trigger of industrial fires involving dangerous substances. Dispersion of smoke plume from such fires and the effects of toxic combustion products are one of the reference scenarios expected in the framework of major accident prevention. Nowadays, tools for impact assessment of these events are rather missing. Detailed knowledge of burning material composition, atmospheric conditions, and other factors are required in order to describe quantitatively the source term of toxic fire products and to evaluate the parameters of smoke plume. Nevertheless, an assessment of toxic emissions from large scale fires involves a high degree of uncertainty, because of the complex character of physical and chemical processes in the harsh environment of uncontrolled flame. Among the others, soot particle formation can be mentioned as still being one of the unresolved problems in combustion chemistry, as well as decomposition pathways of chemical substances. Therefore, simplified approach for estimating the emission factors from outdoor fires of dangerous chemicals, utilizable for major accident prevention and preparedness, was developed and the case study illustrating the application of the proposed method was performed. ALOFT-FT software tool based on large eddy simulation of buoyant fire plumes was employed for predicting the local toxic contamination in the down-wind vicinity of the fire. The database of model input parameters can be effectively modified enabling the simulation of the smoke plume from pool fires or jet fires of arbitrary flammable (or combustible) gas, liquid or solid. This work was supported by the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports of the Czech Republic via the project LD11012 (in the frame of the COST CM0901 Action) and the Ministry of Environment of the Czech Republic (project no. SPII 1a10 45/70).

FIREX (Fire Influence on Regional and Global Environments Experiment): Measurements of Nitrogen Containing Volatile Organic Compounds

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Warneke, C.; Schwarz, J. P.; Yokelson, R. J.; Roberts, J. M.; Koss, A.; Coggon, M.; Yuan, B.; Sekimoto, K.

2017-12-01

A combination of a warmer, drier climate with fire-control practices over the last century have produced a situation in which we can expect more frequent fires and fires of larger magnitude in the Western U.S. and Canada. There are urgent needs to better understand the impacts of wildfire and biomass burning (BB) on the atmosphere and climate system, and for policy-relevant science to aid in the process of managing fires. The FIREX (Fire Influence on Regional and Global Environment Experiment) research effort is a multi-year, multi-agency measurement campaign focused on the impact of BB on climate and air quality from western North American wild fires, where research takes place on scales ranging from the flame-front to the global atmosphere. FIREX includes methods development and small- and large-scale laboratory and field experiments. FIREX will include: emission factor measurements from typical North American fuels in the fire science laboratory in Missoula, Montana; mobile laboratory deployments; ground site measurements at sites influenced by BB from several western states. The main FIREX effort will be a large field study with multiple aircraft and mobile labs in the fire season of 2019. One of the main advances of FIREX is the availability of various new measurement techniques that allows for smoke evaluation in unprecedented detail. The first major effort of FIREX was the fire science laboratory measurements in October 2016, where a large number of previously understudied Nitrogen containing volatile organic compounds (NVOCs) were measured using H3O+CIMS and I-CIMS instruments. The contribution of NVOCs to the total reactive Nitrogen budget and the relationship to the Nitrogen content of the fuel are investigated.

The Application of LANDSAT Multi-Temporal Thermal Infrared Data to Identify Coal Fire in the Khanh Hoa Coal Mine, Thai Nguyen province, Vietnam

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Trinh, Le Hung; Zablotskii, V. R.

2017-12-01

The Khanh Hoa coal mine is a surface coal mine in the Thai Nguyen province, which is one of the largest deposits of coal in the Vietnam. Numerous reasons such as improper mining techniques and policy, as well as unauthorized mining caused surface and subsurface coal fire in this area. Coal fire is a dangerous phenomenon which affects the environment seriously by releasing toxic fumes which causes forest fires, and subsidence of infrastructure surface. This article presents study on the application of LANDSAT multi-temporal thermal infrared images, which help to detect coal fire. The results obtained in this study can be used to monitor fire zones so as to give warnings and solutions to prevent coal fire.

Partially Premixed Flame (PPF) Research for Fire Safety

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Puri, Ishwar K.; Aggarwal, Suresh K.; Lock, Andrew J.; Hegde, Uday

2004-01-01

Incipient fires typically occur after the partial premixing of fuel and oxidizer. The mixing of product species into the fuel/oxidizer mixture influences flame stabilization and fire spread. Therefore, it is important to characterize the impact of different levels of fuel/oxidizer/product mixing on flame stabilization, liftoff and extinguishment under different gravity conditions. With regard to fire protection, the agent concentration required to achieve flame suppression is an important consideration. The initial stage of an unwanted fire in a microgravity environment will depend on the level of partial premixing and the local conditions such as air currents generated by the fire itself and any forced ventilation (that influence agent and product mixing into the fire). The motivation of our investigation is to characterize these impacts in a systematic and fundamental manner.

Space Shuttle Main Engine Low Pressure Oxidizer Turbo-Pump Inducer Dynamic Environment Characterization through Water Model and Hot-Fire Testing

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Arellano, Patrick; Patton, Marc; Schwartz, Alan; Stanton, David

2006-01-01

The Low Pressure Oxidizer Turbopump (LPOTP) inducer on the Block II configuration Space Shuttle Main Engine (SSME) experienced blade leading edge ripples during hot firing. This undesirable condition led to a minor redesign of the inducer blades. This resulted in the need to evaluate the performance and the dynamic environment of the redesign, relative to the current configuration, as part of the design acceptance process. Sub-scale water model tests of the two inducer configurations were performed, with emphasis on the dynamic environment due to cavitation induced vibrations. Water model tests were performed over a wide range of inlet flow coefficient and pressure conditions, representative of the scaled operating envelope of the Block II SSME, both in flight and in ground hot-fire tests, including all power levels. The water test hardware, facility set-up, type and placement of instrumentation, the scope of the test program, specific test objectives, data evaluation process and water test results that characterize and compare the two SSME LPOTP inducers are discussed. In addition, dynamic characteristics of the two water models were compared to hot fire data from specially instrumented ground tests. In general, good agreement between the water model and hot fire data was found, which confirms the value of water model testing for dynamic characterization of rocket engine turbomachinery.

A decision support system for managing forest fire casualties.

PubMed

Bonazountas, Marc; Kallidromitou, Despina; Kassomenos, Pavlos; Passas, Nikos

2007-09-01

Southern Europe is exposed to anthropogenic and natural forest fires. These result in loss of lives, goods and infrastructure, but also deteriorate the natural environment and degrade ecosystems. The early detection and combating of such catastrophes requires the use of a decision support system (DSS) for emergency management. The current literature reports on a series of efforts aimed to deliver DSSs for the management of the forest fires by utilising technologies like remote sensing and geographical information systems (GIS), yet no integrated system exists. This manuscript presents the results of scientific research aiming to the development of a DSS for managing forest fires. The system provides a series of software tools for the assessment of the propagation and combating of forest fires based on Arc/Info, ArcView, Arc Spatial Analyst, Arc Avenue, and Visual C++ technologies. The system integrates GIS technologies under the same data environment and utilises a common user interface to produce an integrated computer system based on semi-automatic satellite image processing (fuel maps), socio-economic risk modelling and probabilistic models that would serve as a useful tool for forest fire prevention, planning and management. Its performance has been demonstrated via real time up-to-date accurate information on the position and evolution of the fire. The system can assist emergency assessment, management and combating of the incident. A site demonstration and validation has been accomplished for the island of Evoia, Greece, an area particularly vulnerable to forest fires due to its ecological characteristics and prevailing wind patterns.

Warning signals for eruptive events in spreading fires

DOE PAGES

Fox, Jerome M.; Whitesides, George M.

2015-02-09

Spreading fires are noisy (and potentially chaotic) systems in which transitions in dynamics are notoriously difficult to predict. As flames move through spatially heterogeneous environments, sudden shifts in temperature, wind, or topography can generate combustion instabilities, or trigger self-stabilizing feedback loops, that dramatically amplify the intensities and rates with which fires propagate. Such transitions are rarely captured by predictive models of fire behavior and, thus, complicate efforts in fire suppression. This study describes a simple, remarkably instructive physical model for examining the eruption of small flames into intense, rapidly moving flames stabilized by feedback between wind and fire (i.e., “wind–firemore » coupling”—a mechanism of feedback particularly relevant to forest fires), and it presents evidence that characteristic patterns in the dynamics of spreading flames indicate when such transitions are likely to occur. Here, in this model system, flames propagate along strips of nitrocellulose with one of two possible modes of propagation: a slow, structured mode, and a fast, unstructured mode sustained by wind–fire coupling. Experimental examination of patterns in dynamics that emerge near bifurcation points suggests that symptoms of critical slowing down (i.e., the slowed recovery of the system from perturbations as it approaches tipping points) warn of impending transitions to the unstructured mode. Lastly, findings suggest that slowing responses of spreading flames to sudden changes in environment (e.g., wind, terrain, temperature) may anticipate the onset of intense, feedback-stabilized modes of propagation (e.g., “blowup fires” in forests).« less

Warning signals for eruptive events in spreading fires

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Fox, Jerome M.; Whitesides, George M.

Spreading fires are noisy (and potentially chaotic) systems in which transitions in dynamics are notoriously difficult to predict. As flames move through spatially heterogeneous environments, sudden shifts in temperature, wind, or topography can generate combustion instabilities, or trigger self-stabilizing feedback loops, that dramatically amplify the intensities and rates with which fires propagate. Such transitions are rarely captured by predictive models of fire behavior and, thus, complicate efforts in fire suppression. This study describes a simple, remarkably instructive physical model for examining the eruption of small flames into intense, rapidly moving flames stabilized by feedback between wind and fire (i.e., “wind–firemore » coupling”—a mechanism of feedback particularly relevant to forest fires), and it presents evidence that characteristic patterns in the dynamics of spreading flames indicate when such transitions are likely to occur. Here, in this model system, flames propagate along strips of nitrocellulose with one of two possible modes of propagation: a slow, structured mode, and a fast, unstructured mode sustained by wind–fire coupling. Experimental examination of patterns in dynamics that emerge near bifurcation points suggests that symptoms of critical slowing down (i.e., the slowed recovery of the system from perturbations as it approaches tipping points) warn of impending transitions to the unstructured mode. Lastly, findings suggest that slowing responses of spreading flames to sudden changes in environment (e.g., wind, terrain, temperature) may anticipate the onset of intense, feedback-stabilized modes of propagation (e.g., “blowup fires” in forests).« less

Fatigue risk management by volunteer fire-fighters: Use of informal strategies to augment formal policy.

PubMed

Dawson, Drew; Mayger, Katherine; Thomas, Matthew J W; Thompson, Kirrilly

2015-11-01

An increasing number and intensity of catastrophic fire events in Australia has led to increasing demands on a mainly volunteer fire-fighting workforce. Despite the increasing likelihood of fatigue in the emergency services environment, there is not yet a systematic, unified approach to fatigue management in fire agencies across Australia. Accordingly, the aim of this study was to identify informal strategies used in volunteer fire-fighting and examine how these strategies are transmitted across the workforce. Thirty experienced Australian volunteer fire-fighters were interviewed in August 2010. The study identified informal fatigue-management behaviours at the individual, team and brigade level that have evolved in fire-fighting environments and are regularly implemented. However, their purpose was not explicitly recognized as such. This apparent paradox - that fatigue proofing behaviours exist but that they are not openly understood as such - may well resolve a potential conflict between a culture of indefatigability in the emergency services sector and the frequent need to operate safely while fatigued. However, formal controls require fire-fighters and their organisations to acknowledge and accept their vulnerability. This suggests two important areas in which to improve formal fatigue risk management in the emergency services sector: (1) identifying and formalising tacit or informal fatigue coping strategies as legitimate elements of the fatigue risk management system; and (2) developing culturally appropriate techniques for systematically communicating fatigue levels to self and others. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Irradiated ignition over solid materials in reduce pressure environment: Fire safety issue in man-made enclosure system

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Nakamura, N.; Aoki, A.

Effects of ambient pressure and oxygen yield on irradiated ignition characteristics over solid combustibles have been studied experimentally Aim of the present study is to elucidate the flammability and chance of fire in depressurized enclosure system and give ideas for the fire safety and fire fighting strategies in such environment Thin cellulosic paper is considered as the solid combustible since cellulose is one of major organic compounds and flammables in the nature Applied atmosphere consists of inert gas either CO2 or N2 and oxygen and various mixture ratios are of concerned Total ambient pressure level is varied from 0 1MPa standard atmospheric pressure to 0 02MPa Ignition is initiated by external thermal flux exposed into the solid surface as a model of unexpected thermal input to initiate the localized fire Thermal degradation of the solid induces combustible gaseous products e g CO H2 or other low class of HCs and the gas mixes with ambient oxygen to form the combustible mixture over the solid Heat transfer from the hot irradiated surface into the mixture accelerates the local exothermic reaction in the gas phase and finally thermal runaway ignition is achieved Ignition event is recorded by high-speed digital video camera to analyze the ignition characteristics Flammable map in partial pressure of oxygen Pox and total ambient pressure Pt plane is made to reveal the fire hazard in depressurized environment Results show that wider flammable range is obtained depending on the imposed ambient

Analyzing post-fire topography at the hillslope-channel interface with terrestrial LiDAR: contrasting geomorphic responses from the 2012 Waldo Canyon Fire of Colorado and the 2013 Springs Fire of California

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Storesund, R.; Chin, A.; Florsheim, J. L.; O'Hirok, L.; Williams, K.; Austin, K. E.

2014-12-01

Mountains areas are increasingly susceptible to wildfires because of warming climates. Although knowledge of the hydro-geomorphological impacts of wildfire has advanced in recent years, much is still unknown regarding how environmental fluxes move through burned watersheds. Because of the loss of vegetation and hydrophobic soils, flash floods often accompany elevated runoff events from burned watersheds, making direct process measurements challenging. Direct measurements are also only partly successful at capturing the spatial variations of post-fire effects. Coupled with short temporal windows for observing such responses, opportunities are often missed for collecting data needed for developing predictive models. Terrestrial LiDAR scanning (TLS) of burned areas allows detailed documentation of the post-fire topography to cm-level accuracy, providing pictures of geomorphic responses not previously possible. This paper reports a comparative study of hillslope-channel interactions, using repeat TLS, in two contrasting environments. Burned by the 2012 Waldo Canyon Fire and 2013 Springs Fire, in Colorado and California respectively, the study sites share many similarities including steep erosive slopes, small drainage areas, and step-pool channel morphologies. TLS provided a tool to test the central hypothesis that, dry ravel, distinct in the California Mediterranean environment, would prompt a greater sedimentological response from the Springs Fire compared to the Waldo Canyon Fire. At selected sites in each area, TLS documented baseline conditions immediately following the fire. Repeat scanning after major storms allowed detection of changes in the landscape. Results show a tendency for sedimentation in river channels in the study sites interacting with dry ravel on hillslopes, whereas erosion dominated the response from the Waldo Canyon Fire with an absence of dry ravel. These data provide clues to developing generalizations for post-fire effects at regional scales, which could assist with managing hazards from wildfires. TLS provides a promising tool to expand the range of studies concerning environmental responses through burned landscapes.

Studies of the exhaust products from solid propellant rocket motors

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Dawbarn, R.; Kinslow, M.

1976-01-01

This study was undertaken to determine the feasibility of conducting environmental chamber tests on the physical processes which occur when a solid rocket motor exhaust mixes with the ambient atmosphere. Of particular interest was the interaction between hydrogen chloride, aluminum oxide, and water vapor. The program consisted of three phases: (1) building a small rocket motor and using it to provide the exhaust species in a controlled environment; (2) evaluating instruments used to detect and measure HCl concentrations and if possible determining whether the HCl existed in the gaseous state or as an acid aerosol; (3) monitoring a series of 6.4-percent scale space shuttle motor tests and comparing the results to the environmental chamber studies. Eighteen firings were conducted in an environmental chamber with the initial ambient relative humidity set at values from 29 to 100 percent. Two additional firings were made in a large shed, and four were made on an open concrete apron. Six test firings at MSFC were monitored, and the ground level concentrations are reported. Evidence is presented which shows that the larger Al2O3 (5 to 50 micrometers) particles from the rocket motor can act as condensation nuclei. Under appropriate ambient conditions where there is sufficient water vapor this results in the formation of an acid aerosol. Droplets of this acid were detected both in the environmental chamber and in the scaled shuttle engine tests.

Precision Strike 2008 Summer Forum

DTIC Science & Technology

2008-01-11

extended ranges, 360--mounted and dismounted Technical fire direction and limited tactical fire direction on all delivery systems Delivery systems that...can rapidly emplace/displace with high rates of fire Accurate on demand, meteorological data to delivery system ranges All munitions with less than 50M...CEP at all ranges Munitions that provide a variety of effects in any environment To achieve this, Field Artillery needs these “enablers” Target

Prediction of dry ice mass for firefighting robot actuation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ajala, M. T.; Khan, Md R.; Shafie, A. A.; Salami, MJE; Mohamad Nor, M. I.

2017-11-01

The limitation in the performance of electric actuated firefighting robots in high-temperature fire environment has led to research on the alternative propulsion system for the mobility of firefighting robots in such environment. Capitalizing on the limitations of these electric actuators we suggested a gas-actuated propulsion system in our earlier study. The propulsion system is made up of a pneumatic motor as the actuator (for the robot) and carbon dioxide gas (self-generated from dry ice) as the power source. To satisfy the consumption requirement (9cfm) of the motor for efficient actuation of the robot in the fire environment, the volume of carbon dioxide gas, as well as the corresponding mass of the dry ice that will produce the required volume for powering and actuation of the robot, must be determined. This article, therefore, presents the computational analysis to predict the volumetric requirement and the dry ice mass sufficient to power a carbon dioxide gas propelled autonomous firefighting robot in a high-temperature environment. The governing equation of the sublimation of dry ice to carbon dioxide is established. An operating time of 2105.53s and operating pressure ranges from 137.9kPa to 482.65kPa were achieved following the consumption rate of the motor. Thus, 8.85m3 is computed as the volume requirement of the CAFFR while the corresponding dry ice mass for the CAFFR actuation ranges from 21.67kg to 75.83kg depending on the operating pressure.

Relative impact of weather vs. fuels on fire regimes in coastal California

Treesearch

Jon E. Keeley

2008-01-01

Extreme fire weather is of over riding importance in determining fire behavior in coastal chaparral and on these landscapes fire suppression policy has not resulted in fire exclusion. There is regional variation in foehn winds, which are most important in southern California. Under these severe fire weather conditions fuel age does not constrain fire behavior. As a...

[Lightning-caused fire, its affecting factors and prediction: a review].

PubMed

Zhang, Ji-Li; Bi, Wu; Wang, Xiao-Hong; Wang, Zi-Bo; Li, Di-Fei

2013-09-01

Lightning-caused fire is the most important natural fire source. Its induced forest fire brings enormous losses to human beings and ecological environment. Many countries have paid great attention to the prediction of lightning-caused fire. From the viewpoint of the main factors affecting the formation of lightning-caused fire, this paper emphatically analyzed the effects and action mechanisms of cloud-to-ground lightning, fuel, meteorology, and terrain on the formation and development process of lightning-caused fire, and, on the basis of this, summarized and reviewed the logistic model, K-function, and other mathematical methods widely used in prediction research of lightning-caused fire. The prediction methods and processes of lightning-caused fire in America and Canada were also introduced. The insufficiencies and their possible solutions for the present researches as well as the directions of further studies were proposed, aimed to provide necessary theoretical basis and literature reference for the prediction of lightning-caused fire in China.

Climatic and weather factors affecting fire occurrence and behavior

Treesearch

Randall P. Benson; John O. Roads; David R. Weise

2009-01-01

Weather and climate have a profound influence on wildland fire ignition potential, fire behavior, and fire severity. Local weather and climate are affected by large-scale patterns of winds over the hemispheres that predispose wildland fuels to fire. The characteristics of wildland fuels, especially the moisture content, ultimately determine fire behavior and the impact...

Shifts in functional traits elevate risk of fire-driven tree dieback in tropical savanna and forest biomes.

PubMed

Pellegrini, Adam F A; Franco, Augusto C; Hoffmann, William A

2016-03-01

Numerous predictions indicate rising CO2 will accelerate the expansion of forests into savannas. Although encroaching forests can sequester carbon over the short term, increased fires and drought-fire interactions could offset carbon gains, which may be amplified by the shift toward forest plant communities more susceptible to fire-driven dieback. We quantify how bark thickness determines the ability of individual tree species to tolerate fire and subsequently determine the fire sensitivity of ecosystem carbon across 180 plots in savannas and forests throughout the 2.2-million km(2) Cerrado region in Brazil. We find that not accounting for variation in bark thickness across tree species underestimated carbon losses in forests by ~50%, totaling 0.22 PgC across the Cerrado region. The lower bark thicknesses of plant species in forests decreased fire tolerance to such an extent that a third of carbon gains during forest encroachment may be at risk of dieback if burned. These results illustrate that consideration of trait-based differences in fire tolerance is critical for determining the climate-carbon-fire feedback in tropical savanna and forest biomes. © 2015 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

The effects of fire temperatures on water soluble heavy metals.

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pereira, P.; Ubeda, X.; Martin, D. A.

2009-04-01

Fire ash are majority composed by base cations, however the mineralized organic matter, led also available to transport a higher quantity of heavy metals that potentially could increase a toxicity in soil and water resources. The amount availability of these elements depend on the environment were the fire took place, burning temperature and combusted tree specie. The soil and water contamination from fire ash has been neglected, because the majority of studies are focused on base cations dynamic. Our research, beside contemplate major elements, is focused in to study the behavior of heavy metals released from ash slurries created at several temperatures under laboratory environment, prescribed fires and wildland fires. The results presented in these communication are preliminary and study the presence of Aluminium (Al3+), Manganese (Mn2+), Iron (Fe2+) and Zinc (Zn2+) of ash slurries generated in laboratory environment at several temperatures (150°, 200°, 250°, 300°, 350°, 400°,450°, 500°, 550°C) from Quercus suber, Quercus robur, Pinus pinea and Pinus pinaster and from a low medium temperature prescribed fire in a forest dominated Quercus suber trees. We observed that ash produced at lower and medium temperatures (<300-400°C) released in water higher contents of Al3+ than unburned sample, especially in Quercus species and Mn2+ in Pinus ashes. Fe2+ and Zn2+ showed a reduced concentration in test solution in relation to unburned sample at all temperatures of exposition. In the results obtained from prescribed fire, we identify a higher release of Al3+ and a decrease of the remain elements. The solubilization of these elements are related with pH levels and ash calcite content, because their ability to capture ions in solution. Moreover, the amount and the type of ions released in relation to unburned sample vary in each specie. In this study Al3+ release is related with Quercus species and Mn2+ with Pinus species. Fire ashes can be an environmental problem, because at long term can increase soil acidity. After all base cations have being leached, pH values decrease, and the heavy metals remaining in the ash are easily transported with unknown impacts on soil and water resources. Research is needed in the study at long term of the effects of fire in metals accumulation in soil resources, and all these aspects will be discussed. Keywords: Fire ash, heavy metals, Quercus suber, Quercus robur, Pinus pinea, Pinus pinaster, prescribed fire, pH, Calcite

Development of the International Space Station (ISS) Fine Water Mist (FWM) Portable Fire Extinguisher

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Clements, Anna L.

2011-01-01

NASA is developing a Fine Water Mist Portable Fire Extinguisher for use on the International Space Station. The International Space Station presently uses two different types of fire extinguishers: a water foam extinguisher in the Russian Segment, and a carbon dioxide extinguisher in the US Segment and Columbus and Kibo pressurized elements. Changes in emergency breathing equipment make Fine Water Mist operationally preferable. Supplied oxygen breathing systems allow for safe discharge of a carbon dioxide fire extinguisher, without concerns of the crew inhaling unsafe levels of carbon dioxide. But the Portable Breathing Apparatus (PBA) offers no more than 15 minutes of capability, and continued use of hose based supplied oxygen system increases the oxygen content in a fire situation. NASA has developed a filtering respirator cartridge for use in a fire environment. It is qualified to provide up to 90 minutes of capability, and because it is a filtering respirator it does not add oxygen to the environment. The fire response respirator cartridge does not filter carbon dioxide (CO2), so a crew member discharging a CO2 fire extinguisher while wearing this filtering respirator would be at risk of inhaling unsafe levels of CO2. Fine Water Mist extinguishes a fire without creating a large volume of air with reduced oxygen and elevated CO2. From a flight hardware design perspective, the fine water mist fire extinguisher has two major elements: (1) the nozzle and crew interface, and (2) the tank. The nozzle and crew interface has been under development for several years. It has gone through several design iterations, and has been part of more than 400 fire challenge and spray characterizations. The crew and vehicle interface aspects of the design will use the heritage of the CO2 based Portable Fire Extinguisher, to minimize the disruption to the crew and integration impacts to the ISS. The microgravity use environment of the system poses a set of unique design requirements specifically for the tank. The nozzle requirements drive a tank pressure that is 2-5 times higher than any commercially available water mist systems. Microgravity requires deliberate separation of gas and water, facilitated by a bladder, a diaphragm, a piston, or separate tanks. This paper will describe the design details of the tank and the nozzle, and discuss the trade studies that informed the decisions to select the tank and nozzle configuration.

Fire-retardant decorative inks for aircraft interiors

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Kourtides, D. A.; Nir, Z.; Mikroyannidis, J. A.

1985-01-01

Commercial and experimental fire retardants were screened as potential fire retardants for acrylic printing inks used on aircraft interior sandwich panels. The fire retardants are selected according to their physical properties and their thermostabilities. A criterion for selecting a more stable fire retardant is established. Thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) and differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) are used to determine thermostabilities. Results show that the fire retardant formulations are more thermally stable than the acrylic ink control. It is determined that an ink formulation containing a brominated phenol and carboxy-terminated butadiene acrylonitrile which has been modified with a brominated polymeric additive (BPA), yields the highest limiting oxygen index (LOI) of all the compounds tested. All of the fire-retardant formulations have a higher oxygen index than the baseline acrylic ink.

[Research progress in post-fire debris flow].

PubMed

Di, Xue-ying; Tao, Yu-zhu

2013-08-01

The occurrence of the secondary disasters of forest fire has significant impacts on the environment quality and human health and safety. Post-fire debris flow is one of the most hazardous secondary disasters of forest fire. To understand the occurrence conditions of post-fire debris flow and to master its occurrence situation are the critical elements in post-fire hazard assessment. From the viewpoints of vegetation, precipitation threshold and debris flow material sources, this paper elaborated the impacts of forest fire on the debris flow, analyzed the geologic and geomorphic conditions, precipitation and slope condition that caused the post-fire debris flow as well as the primary mechanisms of debris-flow initiation caused by shallow landslide or surface runoff, and reviewed the research progress in the prediction and forecast of post-fire debris flow and the related control measures. In the future research, four aspects to be focused on were proposed, i. e., the quantification of the relationships between the fire behaviors and environmental factors and the post-fire debris flow, the quantitative research on the post-fire debris flow initiation and movement processes, the mechanistic model of post-fire debris flow, and the rapid and efficient control countermeasures of post-fire debris flow.

24 CFR 232.620 - Determination of compliance by HHS.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-04-01

... AUTHORITIES MORTGAGE INSURANCE FOR NURSING HOMES, INTERMEDIATE CARE FACILITIES, BOARD AND CARE HOMES, AND... of Fire Safety Equipment Special Requirements § 232.620 Determination of compliance by HHS. An... the fire safety equipment has been installed, will be in compliance with the HHS requirements for fire...

Fire modeling in a nonventilated corridor

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lulea, Marius Dorin; Iordache, Vlad; Năstase, Ilinca

2018-02-01

The main objective of this study was to determine the effect of fire in a nonventilated corridor. A real-scale model of a corridor has been modeled in Fire Dynamics Simulator(F.D.S.) in order to determine the evolution of indoor temperatures, the visibility and the oxygen quantities during a fire. The start time of a sprinkler has also been determined. The use of sprinklers in buildings has become a necessity and a requirement imposed by technical norms. The provision of this type of installation has become a common feature in buildings with a high fire risk, with two main effects: fire extinction and protection of structural and partition elements from high temperatures[15]. The ultimate goal is to ensure optimal conditions for saving the building users, intervention teams and maintaining the stability of the building. Low temperatures and good visibility on the escape routes during a fire are the basic conditions to ensure the optimal evacuation of users.

Early Forest Fire Detection Using Radio-Acoustic Sounding System

PubMed Central

Sahin, Yasar Guneri; Ince, Turker

2009-01-01

Automated early fire detection systems have recently received a significant amount of attention due to their importance in protecting the global environment. Some emergent technologies such as ground-based, satellite-based remote sensing and distributed sensor networks systems have been used to detect forest fires in the early stages. In this study, a radio-acoustic sounding system with fine space and time resolution capabilities for continuous monitoring and early detection of forest fires is proposed. Simulations show that remote thermal mapping of a particular forest region by the proposed system could be a potential solution to the problem of early detection of forest fires. PMID:22573967

Using climate information for fuels management

USGS Publications Warehouse

Kolden, Crystal A.; Brown, Timothy J.

2008-01-01

Climate has come to the forefront of wildfire discussions in recent years as research contributes to the general understanding of how climate influences fuels availability to burn, the occurrence of severe fire weather conditions and other wildfire parameters. This understanding has crossed over into wildfire management applications through the creation of tools like climate forecasts for wildfire and drought indices, which are now widely used in wildfire suppression and mitigation planning. The overall question is how can climate information help fire managers meet management objectives? Climate underlies weather. For example, a number of days could be generally wet, but that may occur in the context of a two-year overall drought. Knowing the baseline climate is not only critical to preventing escaped prescribed fires, but also how it may affect fire behavior, fire effects and whether or not fire managers will meet their fuels management objectives. Thus, for fire managers to use prescribed and WFU fire safely and effectively, and to minimize the number of escaped fires and conversions to suppression, they need to understand how current climate conditions will impact the use of fire. One example is the need to use prescribed fire under set “burn windows”. Since meteorological conditions vary considerably from year to year for a given day, fire managers will be more successful in utilizing burn windows effectively if they understand those climate thresholds conducive to an increased number of safe burn windows, and are able to predict and take advantage of those burn windows. While climate and wildfire has been studied extensively, climate and fire use has not. The initial goal of this project was to assess how climate impacts prescribed fire use in a more general sense. After a preliminary informal survey in the spring of 2003, we determined that 1) there is insufficient data (less than 10 years) to conduct empirical correlative studies similar to those of the relationships between climate and wildfire (e.g., Swetnam and Betancourt 1990), and 2) prescribed fire policy has many regulations that potentially inhibited the use of climate information for decision-making. It was also determined that because fire use is a human decision, it would be more informative to ask fire managers themselves how climate impacts fire use through their decision-making processes, and whether or not they use climate information for prescribed fire. The first task for this project was to complete a regional survey of prescribed fire managers in California and Nevada. During the second phase of the project, additional prescribed fire managers were surveyed across the country. During the third year a second survey of WFU managers was completed. The goals of these inquiries were to determine: 1) If fire managers use climate information for fuels management; 2) The perspective fire managers have towards climate affecting fuels management; 3) Determine any obstacles that make it difficult to use climate information for fuels management; and 4) Determine climate information managers need to help them make better decisions for fire use.

Relation Between Inflammables and Ignition Sources in Aircraft Environments

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Scull, Wilfred E

1950-01-01

A literature survey was conducted to determine the relation between aircraft ignition sources and inflammables. Available literature applicable to the problem of aircraft fire hazards is analyzed and, discussed herein. Data pertaining to the effect of many variables on ignition temperatures, minimum ignition pressures, and minimum spark-ignition energies of inflammables, quenching distances of electrode configurations, and size of openings incapable of flame propagation are presented and discussed. The ignition temperatures and the limits of inflammability of gasoline in air in different test environments, and the minimum ignition pressure and the minimum size of openings for flame propagation of gasoline - air mixtures are included. Inerting of gasoline - air mixtures is discussed.

Fire Safety Technician

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Moore, Pam

2007-01-01

Fire protection is one of the most important considerations in the construction and operation of industrial plants and commercial buildings. Fire insurance rates are determined by fire probability factors, such as the type of construction, ease of transporting personnel, and the quality and quantity of fire protection equipment available. Because…

Topographic and fire weather controls of fire refugia in forested ecosystems of northwestern North America

USGS Publications Warehouse

Krawchuk, Meg A.; Haire, Sandra L.; Coop, Jonathan D.; Parisien, Marc-Andre; Whitman, Ellen; Chong, Geneva W.; Miller, Carol

2016-01-01

for seven study fires that burned in conifer-dominated forested landscapes of the Western Cordillera of Canada between 2001 and 2014. We fit nine models, each for distinct levels of fire weather and terrain ruggedness. Our framework revealed that the predictability and abundance of fire refugia varied among these environmental settings. We observed highest predictability under moderate fire weather conditions and moderate terrain ruggedness (ROC-AUC = 0.77), and lowest predictability in flatter landscapes and under high fire weather conditions (ROC-AUC = 0.63–0.68). Catchment slope, local aspect, relative position, topographic wetness, topographic convergence, and local slope all contributed to discriminating where refugia occur but the relative importance of these topographic controls differed among environments. Our framework allows us to characterize the predictability of contemporary fire refugia across multiple environmental settings and provides important insights for ecosystem resilience, wildfire management, conservation planning, and climate change adaptation.

Priorities for Microgravity Combustion Research and Goals for Workshop Discussions

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Faeth, Gerard M.

1993-01-01

Several concerns motivate fundamental research: combustion-generated pollutants are re-emerging as a major problem, new combustion technologies are needed for effective energy utilization, municipal and hazardous waste incineration are needed to replace landfills and storage, new combustion technologies are needed for advanced aircraft and spacecraft propulsion systems, and current understanding of fires and explosion hazards is limited - particularly for space-craft environments. Thus, it is of interest to determine how experimentation using microgravity facilities can advance research relevant to these problems.

Modified RS2101 rocket engine study program

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

1971-01-01

The purpose of the program is to perform design studies and analyses to determine the effects of incorporating a 60:1 expansion area ratio nozzle extension, extended firing time, and modified operating conditions and environments on the MM'71 rocket engine assembly. An injector-to-thrust chamber seal study was conducted to define potential solutions for leakage past this joint. The results and recommendations evolving from the engine thermal analyses, the injector-to-thrust chamber seal studies, and the nozzle extension joint stress analyses are presented.

Experiments with the Skylab fire detectors in zero gravity

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Linford, R. M. F.

1972-01-01

The Skylab fire detector was evaluated in a zero gravity environment. To conduct the test, small samples of spacecraft materials were ignited in a 5 psi oxygen-rich atmosphere inside a combustion chamber. The chamber free-floated in the cabin of a C-135 aircraft, as the aircraft executed a Keplerian parabola. Up to 10 seconds of zero-gravity combustion were achieved. The Skylab fire-detector tubes viewed the flames from a simulated distance of 3m, and color movies were taken to record the nature of the fire. The experiments established the unique form of zero-gravity fires for a wide range of materials. From the tube-output data, the alarm threshold and detector time constant were verified for the Skylab Fire Detection System.

Spacecraft Fire Safety and Microgravity Combustion Research

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Tien, James S.; Ferkul, Paul (Technical Monitor)

2001-01-01

Fire safety is an important concern in our daily lives and it plays a special role in the human presence in space. In a spacecraft, the outside environment is hostile and the opportunity to escape is small. Rescue missions are difficult and time consuming. As a result, we should avoid the occurrence of fires in spacecraft as much as possible. If a fire occurs, we need to keep it small and under control. This implies that the materials used on board the spacecraft should be screened carefully, all the machines and devices need to be operated without accident, and fire detectors have to function properly. Once a fire is detected, it can be extinguished quickly and the cabin can be cleaned up to restore operation and sustain life.

Analysis of aerosol composition data for western United States wildfires between 2005 and 2015: Dust emissions, chloride depletion, and most enhanced aerosol constituents.

PubMed

Schlosser, Joseph S; Braun, Rachel A; Bradley, Trevor; Dadashazar, Hossein; MacDonald, Alexander B; Aldhaif, Abdulmonam A; Aghdam, Mojtaba Azadi; Mardi, Ali Hossein; Xian, Peng; Sorooshian, Armin

2017-08-27

This study examines major wildfires in the western United States between 2005 and 2015 to determine which species exhibit the highest percent change in mass concentration on day of peak fire influence relative to preceding nonfire days. Forty-one fires were examined using the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Interagency Monitoring of Protected Visual Environments (IMPROVE) data set. Organic carbon (OC) and elemental carbon (EC) constituents exhibited the highest percent change increase. The sharpest enhancements were for the volatile (OC1) and semivolatile (OC2) OC fractions, suggestive of secondary organic aerosol formation during plume transport. Of the noncarbonaceous constituents, Cl, P, K, NO 3 - , and Zn levels exhibited the highest percent change. Dust was significantly enhanced in wildfire plumes, based on significant enhancements in fine soil components (i.e., Si, Ca, Al, Fe, and Ti) and PM coarse (i.e., PM 10 -PM 2.5 ). A case study emphasized how transport of wildfire plumes significantly impacted downwind states, with higher levels of fine soil and PM coarse at the downwind state (Arizona) as compared to the source of the fires (California). A global model (Navy Aerosol Analysis and Prediction System, NAAPS) did not capture the dust influence over California or Arizona during this case event because it is not designed to resolve dust dynamics in fires, which motivates improved treatment of such processes. Significant chloride depletion was observed on the peak EC day for almost a half of the fires examined. Size-resolved measurements during two specific fires at a coastal California site revealed significant chloride reductions for particle aerodynamic diameters between 1 and 10 μm.

Analysis of aerosol composition data for western United States wildfires between 2005 and 2015: Dust emissions, chloride depletion, and most enhanced aerosol constituents

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Schlosser, Joseph S.; Braun, Rachel A.; Bradley, Trevor; Dadashazar, Hossein; MacDonald, Alexander B.; Aldhaif, Abdulmonam A.; Aghdam, Mojtaba Azadi; Mardi, Ali Hossein; Xian, Peng; Sorooshian, Armin

2017-08-01

This study examines major wildfires in the western United States between 2005 and 2015 to determine which species exhibit the highest percent change in mass concentration on day of peak fire influence relative to preceding nonfire days. Forty-one fires were examined using the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Interagency Monitoring of Protected Visual Environments (IMPROVE) data set. Organic carbon (OC) and elemental carbon (EC) constituents exhibited the highest percent change increase. The sharpest enhancements were for the volatile (OC1) and semivolatile (OC2) OC fractions, suggestive of secondary organic aerosol formation during plume transport. Of the noncarbonaceous constituents, Cl, P, K, NO3-, and Zn levels exhibited the highest percent change. Dust was significantly enhanced in wildfire plumes, based on significant enhancements in fine soil components (i.e., Si, Ca, Al, Fe, and Ti) and PMcoarse (i.e., PM10-PM2.5). A case study emphasized how transport of wildfire plumes significantly impacted downwind states, with higher levels of fine soil and PMcoarse at the downwind state (Arizona) as compared to the source of the fires (California). A global model (Navy Aerosol Analysis and Prediction System, NAAPS) did not capture the dust influence over California or Arizona during this case event because it is not designed to resolve dust dynamics in fires, which motivates improved treatment of such processes. Significant chloride depletion was observed on the peak EC day for almost a half of the fires examined. Size-resolved measurements during two specific fires at a coastal California site revealed significant chloride reductions for particle aerodynamic diameters between 1 and 10 μm.

Analysis of aerosol composition data for western United States wildfires between 2005 and 2015: Dust emissions, chloride depletion, and most enhanced aerosol constituents

PubMed Central

Schlosser, Joseph S.; Braun, Rachel A.; Bradley, Trevor; Dadashazar, Hossein; MacDonald, Alexander B.; Aldhaif, Abdulmonam A.; Aghdam, Mojtaba Azadi; Mardi, Ali Hossein; Xian, Peng; Sorooshian, Armin

2017-01-01

This study examines major wildfires in the western United States between 2005 and 2015 to determine which species exhibit the highest percent change in mass concentration on day of peak fire influence relative to preceding nonfire days. Forty-one fires were examined using the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Interagency Monitoring of Protected Visual Environments (IMPROVE) data set. Organic carbon (OC) and elemental carbon (EC) constituents exhibited the highest percent change increase. The sharpest enhancements were for the volatile (OC1) and semivolatile (OC2) OC fractions, suggestive of secondary organic aerosol formation during plume transport. Of the noncarbonaceous constituents, Cl, P, K, NO3−, and Zn levels exhibited the highest percent change. Dust was significantly enhanced in wildfire plumes, based on significant enhancements in fine soil components (i.e., Si, Ca, Al, Fe, and Ti) and PMcoarse (i.e., PM10–PM2.5). A case study emphasized how transport of wildfire plumes significantly impacted downwind states, with higher levels of fine soil and PMcoarse at the downwind state (Arizona) as compared to the source of the fires (California). A global model (Navy Aerosol Analysis and Prediction System, NAAPS) did not capture the dust influence over California or Arizona during this case event because it is not designed to resolve dust dynamics in fires, which motivates improved treatment of such processes. Significant chloride depletion was observed on the peak EC day for almost a half of the fires examined. Size-resolved measurements during two specific fires at a coastal California site revealed significant chloride reductions for particle aerodynamic diameters between 1 and 10 μm. PMID:28955601

24 CFR 232.620 - Determination of compliance by HHS.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-04-01

... of Fire Safety Equipment Special Requirements § 232.620 Determination of compliance by HHS. An... the fire safety equipment has been installed, will be in compliance with the HHS requirements for fire... services along with a plan prepared by the applicant for correcting those deficiencies. In such event, HHS...

24 CFR 232.620 - Determination of compliance by HHS.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-04-01

... of Fire Safety Equipment Special Requirements § 232.620 Determination of compliance by HHS. An... the fire safety equipment has been installed, will be in compliance with the HHS requirements for fire... services along with a plan prepared by the applicant for correcting those deficiencies. In such event, HHS...

44 CFR 204.24 - Determination on request for a fire management assistance declaration.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-10-01

... 44 Emergency Management and Assistance 1 2010-10-01 2010-10-01 false Determination on request for a fire management assistance declaration. 204.24 Section 204.24 Emergency Management and Assistance FEDERAL EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT AGENCY, DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY DISASTER ASSISTANCE FIRE MANAGEMENT...

Fire suppression effectiveness for simultaneous fires: an examination of fire histories

Treesearch

Larry F. Bednar; Romain Mees; David Strauss

1990-01-01

We examined fire and weather records for areas of the western United States for the period 1970-1984 to determine the effects of simultaneous wildfire occurrence on fire suppression efforts. Burning conditions were accounted for by use of short strings of fires which involved simultaneous suppression efforts. These strings were matched with closely preceding isolated...

Aerothermodynamic Design of the Mars Science Laboratory Backshell and Parachute Cone

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Edquist, Karl T.; Dyakonov, Artem A.; Wright, Michael J.; Tang, Chun Y.

2009-01-01

Aerothermodynamic design environments are presented for the Mars Science Laboratory entry capsule backshell and parachute cone. The design conditions are based on Navier-Stokes flowfield simulations on shallow (maximum total heat load) and steep (maximum heat flux) design entry trajectories from a 2009 launch. Transient interference effects from reaction control system thruster plumes were included in the design environments when necessary. The limiting backshell design heating conditions of 6.3 W/sq cm for heat flux and 377 J/sq cm for total heat load are not influenced by thruster firings. Similarly, the thrusters do not affect the parachute cover lid design environments (13 W/sq cm and 499 J/sq cm). If thruster jet firings occur near peak dynamic pressure, they will augment the design environments at the interface between the backshell and parachute cone (7 W/sq cm and 174 J/sq cm). Localized heat fluxes are higher near the thruster fairing during jet firings, but these areas did not require additional thermal protection material. Finally, heating bump factors were developed for antenna radomes on the parachute cone

29 CFR 1926.155 - Definitions applicable to this subpart.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-07-01

... part, fire resistance shall be determined by the Standard Methods of Fire Tests of Building... knowledgeable, trained, and skilled in the safe evacuation of employees during emergency situations and in assisting in fire fighting operations. (f) Fire resistance means so resistant to fire that, for specified...

29 CFR 1926.155 - Definitions applicable to this subpart.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-07-01

... part, fire resistance shall be determined by the Standard Methods of Fire Tests of Building... knowledgeable, trained, and skilled in the safe evacuation of employees during emergency situations and in assisting in fire fighting operations. (f) Fire resistance means so resistant to fire that, for specified...

29 CFR 1926.155 - Definitions applicable to this subpart.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-07-01

... part, fire resistance shall be determined by the Standard Methods of Fire Tests of Building... knowledgeable, trained, and skilled in the safe evacuation of employees during emergency situations and in assisting in fire fighting operations. (f) Fire resistance means so resistant to fire that, for specified...

29 CFR 1926.155 - Definitions applicable to this subpart.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-07-01

... part, fire resistance shall be determined by the Standard Methods of Fire Tests of Building... knowledgeable, trained, and skilled in the safe evacuation of employees during emergency situations and in assisting in fire fighting operations. (f) Fire resistance means so resistant to fire that, for specified...

29 CFR 1926.155 - Definitions applicable to this subpart.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-07-01

... part, fire resistance shall be determined by the Standard Methods of Fire Tests of Building... knowledgeable, trained, and skilled in the safe evacuation of employees during emergency situations and in assisting in fire fighting operations. (f) Fire resistance means so resistant to fire that, for specified...

Potential release of fibers from burning carbon composites. [aircraft fires

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bell, V. L.

1980-01-01

A comprehensive experimental carbon fiber source program was conducted to determine the potential for the release of conductive carbon fibers from burning composites. Laboratory testing determined the relative importance of several parameters influencing the amounts of single fibers released, while large-scale aviation jet fuel pool fires provided realistic confirmation of the laboratory data. The dimensions and size distributions of fire-released carbon fibers were determined, not only for those of concern in an electrical sense, but also for those of potential interest from a health and environmental standpoint. Fire plume and chemistry studies were performed with large pool fires to provide an experimental input into an analytical modelling of simulated aircraft crash fires. A study of a high voltage spark system resulted in a promising device for the detection, counting, and sizing of electrically conductive fibers, for both active and passive modes of operation.

Space station contamination modeling

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Gordon, T. D.

1989-01-01

Current plans for the operation of Space Station Freedom allow the orbit to decay to approximately an altitude of 200 km before reboosting to approximately 450 km. The Space Station will encounter dramatically increasing ambient and induced environmental effects as the orbit decays. Unfortunately, Shuttle docking, which has been of concern as a high contamination period, will likely occur during the time when the station is in the lowest orbit. The combination of ambient and induced environments along with the presence of the docked Shuttle could cause very severe contamination conditions at the lower orbital altitudes prior to Space Station reboost. The purpose here is to determine the effects on the induced external environment of Space Station Freedom with regard to the proposed changes in altitude. The change in the induced environment will be manifest in several parameters. The ambient density buildup in front of ram facing surfaces will change. The source of such contaminants can be outgassing/offgassing surfaces, leakage from the pressurized modules or experiments, purposeful venting, and thruster firings. The third induced environment parameter with altitude dependence is the glow. In order to determine the altitude dependence of the induced environment parameters, researchers used the integrated Spacecraft Environment Model (ISEM) which was developed for Marshall Space Flight Center. The analysis required numerous ISEM runs. The assumptions and limitations for the ISEM runs are described.

The oxidation of Cr(III) to Cr(VI) in the environment by atmospheric oxygen during the bush fires.

PubMed

Panichev, N; Mabasa, W; Ngobeni, P; Mandiwana, K; Panicheva, S

2008-05-30

The presence of Cr(VI) in soils and plants of remote unpolluted areas can be explained by partial oxidation of Cr(III) with atmospheric oxygen during seasonable bush fires, which are rather frequent event in South Africa. Experiments with thermal treatment of a veld grass, Hyperthelia dissoluta, in muffle furnace at high temperature, followed by electrothermal atomic absorption spectrometry (ETAAS) determination of chromium, show a remarkable increase in Cr(VI) concentration from initial 2.5 to 23.2% after the treatment of grass ash at 500 degrees C and to 58.1% at 900 degrees C. Before ETAAS determination, the two chromium species of interest were separated by the treatment of samples with 0.1M Na2CO3. Thermodynamic calculations confirm the possibility of Cr(III) to Cr(VI) oxidation with atmospheric oxygen at high temperature in alkaline media, which is typical for vegetation ash. Analysis of field samples show that percent of Cr(VI), in respect to the total amount of chromium increased from initial 2.5% in grass to 9.3% in ash of grass. Without oxidation the percent of Cr(VI) in grass and ash of grass should be a constant value. After the fire Cr(VI) concentration in top soil (0-3 cm) increased from 0.3+/-0.05 to 1.8+/-0.5 microg g(-1) and the total Cr from 26+/-9 to 69+/-14 microg g(-1). The reason for the appearance of additional amount of Cr on top soil can be explained by condensation of chromium species from flame and shouldering ash on a soil surface. The results of studies demonstrate that Cr(VI) is formed by Cr(III) oxidation with atmospheric oxygen at high temperature during bush fires.

Initial Burn Pan (JMTF) Testing Results

DTIC Science & Technology

2016-03-01

of Testing and Materials (ASTM) standard for fire - resistant boom. It had not been used for over 15 years and was almost completely destroyed when...Environment Canada had produced operational guides, provided standards for fire - resistant booms and igniting techniques needed to perform offshore burns...are currently in the smoke zone; and the heat from the fire could be felt from that area. While no one was injured, some miscommunication at the

40 CFR Table 6 to Subpart IIIi of... - Optional 3-Mode Test Cycle for Stationary Fire Pump Engines

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 6 2010-07-01 2010-07-01 false Optional 3-Mode Test Cycle for.... IIII, Table 6 Table 6 to Subpart IIII of Part 60—Optional 3-Mode Test Cycle for Stationary Fire Pump Engines [As stated in § 60.4210(g), manufacturers of fire pump engines may use the following test cycle...

Fire debris analysis for forensic fire investigation using laser induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Choi, Soojin; Yoh, Jack J.

2017-08-01

The possibility verification of the first attempt to apply LIBS to arson investigation was performed. LIBS has capabilities for real time in-situ analysis and depth profiling. It can provide valuable information about the fire debris that are complementary to the classification of original sample components and combustion residues. In this study, fire debris was analyzed to determine the ignition source and existence of a fire accelerant using LIBS spectra and depth profiling analysis. Fire debris chemical composition and carbon layer thickness determines the possible ignition source while the carbon layer thickness of combusted samples represents the degree of sample carbonization. When a sample is combusted with fire accelerants, a thicker carbon layer is formed because the burning rate is increased. Therefore, depth profiling can confirm the existence of combustion accelerants, which is evidence of arson. Also investigation of fire debris by depth profiling is still possible when a fire is extinguished with water from fire hose. Such data analysis and in-situ detection of forensic signals via the LIBS may assist fire investigation at crime scenes.

The estimation of electrical cable fire-induced damage limits

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Nowlen, S. P.; Jacobus, M. J.

Sandia National Laboratories has, for several years, been engaged in the performance of both fire safety and electrical equipment qualification research under independent programs sponsored by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Recent comparisons between electrical cable thermal damageability data gathered independently in these two efforts indicate that a direct correlation exists between certain of the recent cable thermal vulnerability information gathered under equipment qualification conditions and thermal damageability in a fire environment. This direct correlation allows for a significant expansion of the data base on estimated cable thermal vulnerability limits in a fire environment because of the wide range of cable types and products that have been evaluated as a part of the equipment qualification research. This paper provides a discussion of the basis for the derived correlation, and presents estimated cable thermal damage limits for a wide range of generic cable types and specific cable products. The supposition that a direct correlation exists is supported through direct comparisons of the test results for certain specific cable products. The proposed supplemental cable fire vulnerability data gained from examination of the equipment qualification results is presented. These results should be of particular interest to those engaged in the evaluation of fire risk for industrial facilities, including nuclear power plants.

Fire safety in the operating room.

PubMed

Rinder, Christine Stowe

2008-12-01

Elimination of flammable anesthetic gases has had little effect on operating-room fires except to change their etiology. Electrocautery and lasers, in an oxygen-enriched environment, can ignite even the most fire-resistant materials, including the patient, and the fire triad possibilities in the operating room are nearly limitless. This review will: identify operating room contents capable of acting as ignition/oxidizer/fuel sources, highlight operating room items that are uniquely potent fire triad contributors, and operating room identify settings where fire risk is enhanced by proximity of triad components in time or space. Anesthesiologists are cognizant of the risk of airway surgery fires due to laser ignition of the endotracheal tube and/or its contents. Recently, however, head/neck surgery under monitored anesthesia care has emerged as a high-risk setting for operating room fires; burn injuries represent 20% of monitored anesthesia care-related malpractice claims, 95% of which involved head/neck surgery. Operating room fires are infrequent but catastrophic. Operating room fire prevention depends on: (a)understanding how fire triad elements interact to create a fire, (b) recognizing how standard operating-room equipment, materials, and supplemental oxygen can become one of those elements, and (c) vigilance for circumstances that bring fire triad elements into close proximity.

Development of the International Space Station (ISS) Fine Water Mist (FWM) Portable Fire Extinguisher ICES Abstract

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Clements, Anna L.; Carlile, Christie; Graf, John; Young, Gina

2011-01-01

NASA is developing a Fine Water Mist (FWM) Portable Fire Extinguisher (PFE) for use on the International Space Station. The International Space Station presently uses two different types of fire extinguishers: a water foam extinguisher in the Russian Segment, and a carbon dioxide extinguisher in the US Segment and Columbus and Kibo pressurized elements. Changes in emergency breathing equipment make Fine Water Mist operationally preferable. Supplied oxygen breathing systems allow for safe discharge of a carbon dioxide fire extinguisher, without concerns of the crew inhaling unsafe levels of carbon dioxide. But the Portable Breathing Apparatus (PBA) offers no more than 15 minutes of capability, and continued use of hose based supplied oxygen system increases the oxygen content in a fire situation. NASA has developed a filtering respirator cartridge for use in a fire environment. It is qualified to provide up to 90 minutes of capability, and because it is a filtering respirator it does not add oxygen to the environment. The fire response respirator cartridge does not filter carbon dioxide (CO2), so a crew member discharging a CO2 fire extinguisher while wearing this filtering respirator would be at risk of inhaling unsafe levels of CO2. FWM extinguishes a fire without creating a large volume of air with reduced oxygen and elevated CO2. The following paper will discuss the unique functional and performance requirements that have been levied on the FWM PFE. In addition, the NASA ISS specific fire standards will be described which were developed to establish acceptable extinguisher performance. The paper will also discuss the flight hardware design. The fin e water mist fire extinguisher has two major elements: (1) the nozzle and crew interface, and (2) the tank. The nozzle and crew interface have been under development for several years. They have gone through several design iterations, and have been part of more than 400 fire challenge and spray characterizations. The crew and vehicle interface aspects of the design will use the heritage of the CO2 based Portable Fire Extinguisher, to minimize the disruption to the crew and integration impacts to the ISS. The microgravity use environment of the system poses a set of unique design requirements specifically for the tank. The nozzle requirements drive a tank pressure that is 2-5 times higher than any commercially available water mist systems. Microgravity requires deliberate separation of gas and water, facilitated by a bladder, a diaphragm, a piston, or separate tanks. This paper will describe status of the project to date, the design details of the tank and the nozzle, and discuss the trade studies that informed the decisions to select the tank and nozzle configuration.

Ultraviolet radiation as an ant repellent

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Thorvilson, H.G.; Russell, S.A.; Green, B.

1996-12-31

In an effort to repel red imported fire ants (RIFA) from electrical devices, such as transformers, ultraviolet (UV) light was tested. Initial tests determined if RIFA`s tolerate a UV-irradiated environment when given a choice between UV-irradiated and non-irradiated. All replications in this test indicated that RIFA`s are intolerant of UV-irradiation and sought to escape it. RIFA`s moved to shaded environments and transported their brood out its well. A second test sought to determine if long-term UV-irradiation of the entire colonies cause increased RIFA mortality. Queenright colonies were exposed to UV irradiation of 254nm constantly for 115 days and colonies hadmore » a higher mortality rate than did a control colony. RIFA`s attempted to escape UV light and had increased rate when exposed to UV (254nm), but a practical application of this technique may be detrimental to insulation on electrical wiring.« less

Dynamics of colour polymorphism in a changing environment: fire melanism and then what?

PubMed

Karlsson, Magnus; Caesar, Sofia; Ahnesjö, Jonas; Forsman, Anders

2008-01-01

Studies of whether disturbance events are associated with the changing genetic compositions of natural populations may provide insights into the importance of local selection events in maintaining diversity, and might inform plans for the conservation and protection of that diversity. We examined the dynamics of a colour pattern polymorphism in a natural population of pygmy grasshoppers Tetrix subulata (Orthoptera: Tetrigidae) inhabiting a previously burnt clear-cut area. Data on morph frequencies for wild-caught and captive-reared individuals indicated that the initial dominance of black phenotypes following the fire event was followed by an increased diversity of the polymorphism. This was manifested as the appearance of a novel morph, a decreased incidence of the black morph, and a more even distribution of individuals across alternative morphs following the recurrence of vegetation. We also found that the colour patterns of captive-reared individuals resembled those of their parents and that the degree of within-clutch diversity increased between generations. Our comparisons of morph frequencies across generations and between environments within generations point to a genetic determination of colour pattern, and indicate that the polymorphism is influenced more strongly by selection than by plasticity or migration.

Simulating fire-induced ecological succession with the dynamically coupled fire-vegetation model, ED-SPIFTIRE

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Spessa, A.; Fisher, R.

2009-04-01

The simulation of fire-vegetation feedbacks is crucial for determining fire-induced changes to ecosystem structure and function, and emissions of trace gases and aerosols under future climate change. A new global fire model SPITFIRE (SPread and InTensity of FIRE) has been designed to overcome many of the limitations in existing fire models set within DGVM frameworks (Thonicke et al. 2008). SPITFIRE has been applied in coupled mode globally (Thonicke et al. 2008) and northern Australia (Spessa et al. unpubl.) as part of the LPJ DGVM. It has also been driven with MODIS burnt area data applied to sub-Saharan Africa (Lehsten et al. 2008) as part of the LPJ-GUESS vegetation model (Smith et al. 2001). Recently, Spessa & Fisher (unpubl.) completed the coupling of SPIFTIRE to the Ecosystem Demography (ED) model (Moorecroft et al. 2001), which has been globalised by Dr R. Fisher as part of the development of the new land surface scheme JULES (Joint UK Environment Simulator) within the QUEST Earth System Model (http://www.quest-esm.ac.uk/). In contrast to the LPJ DGVM, ED is a ‘size and age structured' approximation of an individual based gap model. The major innovation of the ED-SPITFIRE model compared with LPJ-SPITFIRE is the categorisation of each climatic grid cell into a series of non-spatially contiguous patches which are defined by a common ‘age since last disturbance'. In theory, the age-class structure of ED facilitates ecologically realistic processes of succession and re-growth to be represented. By contrast, LPJ DGVM adopts an ‘area-based approach' that implicitly averages individual and patch differences across a wider area and across ‘populations' of PFTs. This presentation provides an overview of SPITFIRE, and provides preliminary results from ED-SPITFIRE applied to northern Australian savanna ecosystems which, due to spatio-temporal variation in fire disturbance, comprise a patchwork of grasses and trees at different stages of post-fire succession. Comparisons with similar simulations undertaken with LPJ-SPITFIRE are also presented.

Fire and season of post-fire defoliation effects on biomass, composition and cover in mixed-grass prairie

USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

North American prairies are acknowledged to have evolved with grazing following fire. Given this evolutionary fire-grazing interaction, our objective was to determine whether seasonal timing of defoliation following fire alters subsequent productivity and species composition. Following the April 201...

Prediction errors in wildland fire situation analyses.

Treesearch

Geoffrey H. Donovan; Peter Noordijk

2005-01-01

Wildfires consume budgets and put the heat on fire managers to justify and control suppression costs. To determine the appropriate suppression strategy, land managers must conduct a wildland fire situation analysis (WFSA) when:A wildland fire is expected to or does escape initial attack,A wildland fire managed for resource benefits...

Maximal physical work performance with European standard based fire-protective clothing system and equipment in relation to individual characteristics.

PubMed

Louhevaara, V; Ilmarinen, R; Griefahn, B; Künemund, C; Mäkinen, H

1995-01-01

Every fire fighter needs to wear fire-protective clothing and a self-contained breathing apparatus (SCBA) several times a year while carrying out various fire-fighting and rescue operations in hazardous work environments. The aim of the present study was to quantify the effects of a multilayer turnout suit designed to fulfil European standard EN 469 used over standardized (Nordic) clothing and with SCBA (total mass 25.9 kg) on maximal physical work performance, and to evaluate the relationship between individual characteristics and power output with the fire-protective clothing system and SCBA. The subjects were 12 healthy firemen aged 26-46 years. The range of their body mass, body fat and maximal oxygen consumption was 69-101 kg, 10-20% and 2.70-5.86 l.min-1, respectively. The maximal tests without (control) and with the fire-protective clothing system and SCBA were carried out on a treadmill in a thermoneutral environment. When compared to the control test, the decrease in the maximal power output in terms of maximal working time and walking speed averaged 25% (P < 0.001) varying from 18% to 34% with the fire-protective clothing system and SCBA. At maximum, no significant differences were found in pulmonary ventilation, absolute oxygen consumption, the respiratory exchange ratio, heart rate, systolic blood pressure, the rate-pressure product, mechanical efficiency, and the rating of perceived exertion between the tests with and without the fire-protective clothing system and SCBA. The reduction of the power output was related to the extra mass of the fire protective clothing and SCBA.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

Solid AFFF Technology Investigation

DTIC Science & Technology

2010-12-01

Aqueous film forming foam, Solid AFFF, MIL - F - 24385 , Foam fire tests, Firefighting handlines, Shipboard fire protection 18. Distribution Statement...28 ft2) fire test in MIL - F -24385F was used as a screening method to determine the viability of the concept. It was determined during this program...military specification for AFFF, MIL - F -24385F, was used as a screening method to determine the viability of the concept. This test has been shown

Fire severity estimated from remote sensing data to evaluate the Coupled Atmosphere-Wildland Fire-Environment (CAWFE) model

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Oliva, P.; Coen, J.; Schroeder, W.

2013-12-01

Fire severity defined as the degree of damage originated from fire on soils and vegetation immediately after the fire, is affected by weather conditions (i.e. wind, air humidity), terrain characteristics (i.e. slope, aspect) and fuel properties (i.e. tree density, fuel moisture content). In this study we evaluated the relationships between fire severity estimated from Earth Observing Advance Land Imager (EO-ALI) images and the heat fluxes produced by the Coupled Atmosphere-Wildland Fire-Environment (CAWFE) model (Coen 2013). We present the results for a large fire occurred in New Mexico in June 2012 which burned 44,330 acres. The EO-ALI sensor (30 m spatial resolution) has nine spectral bands, six of them were designed to mimic Landsat bands and the three additional bands cover 443, 867.5 and 1250 nm. We used a physically-based approach to estimate fire severity developed by De Santis et al. (2009). This method classifies the satellite image into Geophysical Composite burned index (GeoCBI) values, which represent the fire severity within the fire-affected area, using radiative transfer model simulated spectra as reference. This method has been used to characterize fire severity levels using Landsat images and validated with field data (R2 > 0.85). Based on those results we expected a better performance of EO-ALI images due to its improved spectral resolution. On the other hand, CAWFE is composed of two parts: a numerical weather prediction model and a fire behavior module that represents the growth of a wildland fire in response to factors such as wind, terrain, and fuels, and includes the fire's impact on the atmosphere. To perform the evaluation we selected a stratified random sample by fire severity level. The values of maximum heat flux (sensible, latent), and total heat flux showed a higher correlation with the higher levels of fire severity (GeoCBI: 2.8-3) than with the medium levels of fire severity (GeoCBI: 2.3-2.8). However, the total heat flux proved to have a high correlation with the fire severity estimated in terms of GeoCBI values. The GeoCBI is a semi-quantitative index that takes into account the effects on vegetation by means of evaluating several variables such as, percentage of scorched leaves, height of carbon and change in LAI. Therefore, the results obtained in this study pointed out the good performance of the CAWFE model simulating the effects of fire in vegetation. Interpreting the outputs of the CAWFE model in terms of fire severity will help fire managers and decision makers understand the effects of the fire and prioritize the areas more severely affected. Fire severity classification estimated as GeoCBI values. The GeoCBI range from 0 to 3, where 0 means not affected by fire, and 3 means very high fire severity.

Combined Biological and Chemical Mechanisms for Degradation of Insensitive Munitions in the Presence of Alternate Explosives

DTIC Science & Technology

2017-06-21

military facilities and firing ranges, may pose a risk to the environment10 and humans ’ health .13 As such, it may require a remediation plan for the...fire ranges. Nitroaromatic and nitramine compounds such as explosives are carcinogenic and mutagenic so they pose threat to human health and the...detonations. It is crucial to understand their fate and transport in subsurface environments as they can pose a significant hazard to humans and

Assessing the accuracy of wildland fire situation analysis (WFSA) fire size and suppression cost estimates.

Treesearch

Geoffrey H. Donovan; Peter. Noordijk

2005-01-01

To determine the optimal suppression strategy for escaped wildfires, federal land managers are requiredto conduct a wildland fire situation analysis (WFSA). As part of the WFSA process, fire managers estimate final fire size and suppression costs. Estimates from 58 WFSAs conducted during the 2002 fire season are compared to actual outcomes. Results indicate that...

[Forest lighting fire forecasting for Daxing'anling Mountains based on MAXENT model].

PubMed

Sun, Yu; Shi, Ming-Chang; Peng, Huan; Zhu, Pei-Lin; Liu, Si-Lin; Wu, Shi-Lei; He, Cheng; Chen, Feng

2014-04-01

Daxing'anling Mountains is one of the areas with the highest occurrence of forest lighting fire in Heilongjiang Province, and developing a lightning fire forecast model to accurately predict the forest fires in this area is of importance. Based on the data of forest lightning fires and environment variables, the MAXENT model was used to predict the lightning fire in Daxing' anling region. Firstly, we studied the collinear diagnostic of each environment variable, evaluated the importance of the environmental variables using training gain and the Jackknife method, and then evaluated the prediction accuracy of the MAXENT model using the max Kappa value and the AUC value. The results showed that the variance inflation factor (VIF) values of lightning energy and neutralized charge were 5.012 and 6.230, respectively. They were collinear with the other variables, so the model could not be used for training. Daily rainfall, the number of cloud-to-ground lightning, and current intensity of cloud-to-ground lightning were the three most important factors affecting the lightning fires in the forest, while the daily average wind speed and the slope was of less importance. With the increase of the proportion of test data, the max Kappa and AUC values were increased. The max Kappa values were above 0.75 and the average value was 0.772, while all of the AUC values were above 0.5 and the average value was 0. 859. With a moderate level of prediction accuracy being achieved, the MAXENT model could be used to predict forest lightning fire in Daxing'anling Mountains.

Object-based Forest Fire Analysis for Pedrógão Grande Fire Using Landsat 8 OLI and Sentinel-2A Imagery

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tonbul, H.; Kavzoglu, T.

2017-12-01

Forest fires are among the most important natural disasters with the damage to the natural habitat and human-life. Mapping damaged forest fires is crucial for assessing ecological effects caused by fire, monitoring land cover changes and modeling atmospheric and climatic effects of fire. In this context, satellite data provides a great advantage to users by providing a rapid process of detecting burning areas and determining the severity of fire damage. Especially, Mediterranean ecosystems countries sets the suitable conditions for the forest fires. In this study, the determination of burnt areas of forest fire in Pedrógão Grande region of Portugal occurred in June 2017 was carried out using Landsat 8 OLI and Sentinel-2A satellite images. The Pedrógão Grande fire was one of the largest fires in Portugal, more than 60 people was killed and thousands of hectares were ravaged. In this study, four pairs of pre-fire and post-fire top of atmosphere (TOA) and atmospherically corrected images were utilized. The red and near infrared (NIR) spectral bands of pre-fire and post-fire images were stacked and multiresolution segmentation algorithm was applied. In the segmentation processes, the image objects were generated with estimated optimum homogeneity criteria. Using eCognition software, rule sets have been created to distinguish unburned areas from burned areas. In constructing the rule sets, NDVI threshold values were determined pre- and post-fire and areas where vegetation loss was detected using the NDVI difference image. The results showed that both satellite images yielded successful results for burned area discrimination with a very high degree of consistency in terms of spatial overlap and total burned area (over 93%). Object based image analysis (OBIA) was found highly effective in delineation of burnt areas.

Ecotoxicity of waste water from industrial fires fighting

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Dobes, P.; Danihelka, P.; Janickova, S.; Marek, J.; Bernatikova, S.; Suchankova, J.; Baudisova, B.; Sikorova, L.; Soldan, P.

2012-04-01

As shown at several case studies, waste waters from extinguishing of industrial fires involving hazardous chemicals could be serious threat primary for surrounding environmental compartments (e.g. surface water, underground water, soil) and secondary for human beings, animals and plants. The negative impacts of the fire waters on the environment attracted public attention since the chemical accident in the Sandoz (Schweizerhalle) in November 1986 and this process continues. Last October, special Seminary on this topic has been organized by UNECE in Bonn. Mode of interaction of fire waters with the environment and potential transport mechanisms are still discussed. However, in many cases waste water polluted by extinguishing foam (always with high COD values), flammable or toxic dangerous substances as heavy metals, pesticides or POPs, are released to surface water or soil without proper decontamination, which can lead to environmental accident. For better understanding of this type of hazard and better coordination of firemen brigades and other responders, the ecotoxicity of such type of waste water should be evaluated in both laboratory tests and in water samples collected during real cases of industrial fires. Case studies, theoretical analysis of problem and toxicity tests on laboratory model samples (e.g. on bacteria, mustard seeds, daphnia and fishes) will provide additional necessary information. Preliminary analysis of waters from industrial fires (polymer material storage and galvanic plating facility) in the Czech Republic has already confirmed high toxicity. In first case the toxicity may be attributed to decomposition of burned material and extinguishing foams, in the latter case it can be related to cyanides in original electroplating baths. On the beginning of the year 2012, two years R&D project focused on reduction of extinguish waste water risk for the environment, was approved by Technology Agency of the Czech Republic.

Testing and Selection of Fire-Resistant Materials for Spacecraft Use

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Friedman, Robert; Jackson, Brian; Olson, Sandra

2000-01-01

Spacecraft fire-safety strategy emphasizes prevention, mostly through the selection of onboard items classified accord- ing to their fire resistance. The principal NASA acceptance tests described in this paper assess the flammability of materials and components under "worst-case" normal-gravity conditions of upward flame spread in controlled-oxygen atmospheres. Tests conducted on the ground, however, cannot duplicate the unique fire characteristics in the nonbuoyant low-gravity environment of orbiting spacecraft. Research shows that flammability an fire-spread rates in low gravity are sensitive to forced convection (ventilation flows) and atmospheric-oxygen concentration. These research results are helping to define new material-screening test methods that will better evaluate material performance in spacecraft.

Interactions among wildland fires in a long-established Sierra Nevada natural fire area

USGS Publications Warehouse

Collins, B.M.; Miller, J.D.; Thode, A.E.; Kelly, M.; van Wagtendonk, J.W.; Stephens, S.L.

2009-01-01

We investigate interactions between successive naturally occurring fires, and assess to what extent the environments in which fires burn influence these interactions. Using mapped fire perimeters and satellite-based estimates of post-fire effects (referred to hereafter as fire severity) for 19 fires burning relatively freely over a 31-year period, we demonstrate that fire as a landscape process can exhibit self-limiting characteristics in an upper elevation Sierra Nevada mixed conifer forest. We use the term 'self-limiting' to refer to recurring fire as a process over time (that is, fire regime) consuming fuel and ultimately constraining the spatial extent and lessening fire-induced effects of subsequent fires. When the amount of time between successive adjacent fires is under 9 years, and when fire weather is not extreme (burning index <34.9), the probability of the latter fire burning into the previous fire area is extremely low. Analysis of fire severity data by 10-year periods revealed a fair degree of stability in the proportion of area burned among fire severity classes (unchanged, low, moderate, high). This is in contrast to a recent study demonstrating increasing high-severity burning throughout the Sierra Nevada from 1984 to 2006, which suggests freely burning fires over time in upper elevation Sierra Nevada mixed conifer forests can regulate fire-induced effects across the landscape. This information can help managers better anticipate short- and long-term effects of allowing naturally ignited fires to burn, and ultimately, improve their ability to implement Wildland Fire Use programs in similar forest types. ?? 2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC.

Improvement of Forest Fire Detection Algorithm Using Brightness Temperature Lapse Rate Correction in HIMAWARI-8 IR Channels: Application to the 6 may 2017 Samcheok City, Korea

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Park, S. H.; Park, W.; Jung, H. S.

2018-04-01

Forest fires are a major natural disaster that destroys a forest area and a natural environment. In order to minimize the damage caused by the forest fire, it is necessary to know the location and the time of day and continuous monitoring is required until fire is fully put out. We have tried to improve the forest fire detection algorithm by using a method to reduce the variability of surrounding pixels. We focused that forest areas of East Asia, part of the Himawari-8 AHI coverage, are mostly located in mountainous areas. The proposed method was applied to the forest fire detection in Samcheok city, Korea on May 6 to 10, 2017.

Risks and issues in fire safety on the Space Station

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Friedman, Robert

1993-01-01

A fire in the inhabited portion of a spacecraft is a greatly feared hazard, but fire protection in space operations is complicated by two factors. First, the spacecraft cabin is an enclosed volume, which limits the resources for fire fighting and the options for crew escape. Second, an orbiting spacecraft experiences a balance of forces, creating a near-zero-gravity (microgravity) environment that profoundly affects the characteristics of fire initiation, spread, and suppression. The current Shuttle Orbiter is protected by a fire-detection and suppression system whose requirements are derived of necessity from accepted terrestrial and aircraft standards. While experience has shown that Shuttle fire safety is adequate, designers recognize that improved systems to respond specifically to microgravity fire characteristics are highly desirable. Innovative technology is particularly advisable for the Space Station, a forthcoming space community with a complex configuration and long-duration orbital missions, in which the effectiveness of current fire-protection systems is unpredictable. The development of risk assessments to evaluate the probabilities and consequences of fire incidents in spacecraft are briefly reviewed. It further discusses the important unresolved issues and needs for improved fire safety in the Space Station, including those of material selection, spacecraft atmospheres, fire detection, fire suppression, and post-fire restoration.

78 FR 58960 - Airworthiness Directives; BAE SYSTEMS (OPERATIONS) LIMITED Airplanes

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2013-09-25

... inspection of certain engine and auxiliary power unit (APU) fire extinguishers to determine if the fire... system to extinguish fires in the engine or APU fire zones, possibly resulting in damage to the airplane... Unit (APU) fire zones, possibly resulting in damage to the aeroplane and injury to the occupants. For...

Evaluation of fire hazard inspection procedures in Butte County, California

Treesearch

William S. Folkman

1967-01-01

To assess effectiveness of fire hazard inspection procedures in securing compliance with fire safety requirements, effects of different types and combinations of contacts and timing were determined, and the production capacity of inspectors measured. It was demonstrated that fire law inspection is as much fire prevention education and engineering as it is law...

Dynamics of mangrove-marsh ecotones in subtropical coastal wetlands: fire, sea-level rise, and water levels

USGS Publications Warehouse

Smith, Thomas J.; Foster, Ann M.; Tiling-Range, Ginger; Jones, John W.

2013-01-01

Ecotones are areas of sharp environmental gradients between two or more homogeneous vegetation types. They are a dynamic aspect of all landscapes and are also responsive to climate change. Shifts in the position of an ecotone across a landscape can be an indication of a changing environment. In the coastal Everglades of Florida, USA, a dominant ecotone type is that of mangrove forest and marsh. However, there is a variety of plants that can form the marsh component, including sawgrass (Cladium mariscus [L.] Pohl), needlegrass rush (Juncus roemerianus Scheele), and spikerush (Eleocharis spp.). Environmental factors including water depth, soil type, and occurrence of fires vary across these ecotones, influencing their dynamics. Altered freshwater inflows from upstream and increasing sea level over the past 100 years may have also had an impact. We analyzed a time series of historical aerial photographs for a number of sites in the coastal Everglades and measured change in position of mangrove–marsh ecotones. For three sites, detailed maps were produced and the area of marsh, mangrove, and other habitats was determined for five periods spanning the years 1928 to 2004. Contrary to our initial hypothesis on fire, we found that fire did not prevent mangrove expansion into marsh areas but may in fact assist mangroves to invade some marsh habitats, especially sawgrass. Disparate patterns in mangrove–marsh change were measured at two downstream sites, both of which had multiple fires over from 1948 to 2004. No change in mangrove or marsh area was measured at one site. Mangrove area increased and marsh area decreased at the second of these fire-impacted sites. We measured a significant increase in mangrove area and a decline in marsh area at an upstream site that had little occurrence of fire. At this site, water levels have increased significantly as sea level has risen, and this has probably been a factor in the mangrove expansion.

Determining heat loss into the environment based on comprehensive investigation of boiler performance characteristics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lyubov, V. K.; Malygin, P. V.; Popov, A. N.; Popova, E. I.

2015-08-01

A refined procedure for determining heat loss into the environment from heat-generating installations is presented that takes into account the state of their lining and heat insulation quality. The fraction of radiative component in the total amount of heat loss through the outer surfaces is determined. The results from experimental investigations of the thermal engineering and environmental performance characteristics of a foreign hot-water boiler in firing wood pellets are presented. A conclusion is drawn about the possibility of using such hot-water boilers for supplying heat to low-rise buildings, especially for the conditions of the North-Arctic region. The results from a thermal engineering investigation of wood pellets and furnace residue carried out on installations of a thermal analysis laboratory are presented together with the grain-size composition of fuel and indicators characterizing the mechanical strength of wood pellets. The velocity fields, flue gas flow rates, and soot particle concentrations are determined using the external filtration methods, and the composition of combustion products is investigated using a gas analyzer. The graphs of variation with time of boiler external surface temperature from the moment of achieving the nominal mode of operation and heat loss into the environment for stationary boilers are presented.

Post-fire environments are favourable for plant functioning of seeder and resprouter Mediterranean shrubs, even under drought.

PubMed

Parra, Antonio; Moreno, José M

2017-05-01

Understanding how drought affects seeder and resprouter plants during post-fire regeneration is important for the anticipation of Mediterranean vegetation vulnerability in a context of increasing drought and fire caused by climate change. A Mediterranean shrubland was subjected to various drought treatments (including 45% rainfall reduction, 7 months drought yr -1 ), before and after experimental burning, by means of a rainout-shelter system with an irrigation facility. Predawn shoot water potential (Ψ pd ), relative growth rate (RGR), specific leaf area (SLA) and bulk leaf carbon isotopic composition (δ 13 C) were monitored in the main woody species during the first 3 yr after fire. Cistus ladanifer seedlings showed higher Ψ pd , RGR and SLA, and lower δ 13 C, than unburned plants during the first two post-fire years. Seedlings under drought maintained relatively high Ψ pd , but suffered a decrease in Ψ pd and RGR, and an increase in δ 13 C, relative to control treatments. Erica arborea, E. scoparia and Phillyrea angustifolia resprouts had higher Ψ pd and RGR than unburned plants during the first post-fire year. Resprouters were largely unaffected by drought. Overall, despite marked differences between the two functional groups, post-fire environments were favourable for plant functioning of both seeder and resprouter shrubs, even under the most severe drought conditions implemented. © 2017 The Authors. New Phytologist © 2017 New Phytologist Trust.

Investigating Over Critical Thresholds of Forest Megafires Danger Conditions in Europe Utilising the ECMWF ERA-Interim Reanalysis

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Petroliagkis, Thomas I.; Camia, Andrea; Liberta, Giorgio; Durrant, Tracy; Pappenberger, Florian; San-Miguel-Ayanz, Jesus

2014-05-01

The European Forest Fire Information System (EFFIS) has been established by the Joint Research Centre (JRC) and the Directorate General for Environment (DG ENV) of the European Commission (EC) to support the services in charge of the protection of forests against fires in the EU and neighbour countries, and also to provide the EC services and the European Parliament with information on forest fires in Europe. Within its applications, EFFIS provides current and forecast meteorological fire danger maps up to 6 days. Weather plays a key role in affecting wildfire occurrence and behaviour. Meteorological parameters can be used to derive meteorological fire weather indices that provide estimations of fire danger level at a given time over a specified area of interest. In this work, we investigate the suitability of critical thresholds of fire danger to provide an early warning for megafires (fires > 500 ha) over Europe. Past trends of fire danger are analysed computing daily fire danger from weather data taken from re-analysis fields for a period of 31 years (1980 to 2010). Re-analysis global data sets coming from the construction of high-quality climate records, which combine past observations collected from many different observing and measuring platforms, are capable of describing how Fire Danger Indices have evolved over time at a global scale. The latest and most updated ERA-Interim dataset of the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecast (ECMWF) was used to extract meteorological variables needed to compute daily values of the Canadian Fire Weather Index (CFWI) over Europe, with a horizontal resolution of about 75x75 km. Daily time series of CFWI were constructed and analysed over a total of 1,071 European NUTS3 centroids, resulting in a set of percentiles and critical thresholds. Such percentiles could be used as thresholds to help fire services establish a measure of the significance of CFWI outputs as they relate to levels of fire potential, fuel conditions and fire danger. Median percentile values of fire days accumulated over the 31-year period were compared to median values of all days from that period. As expected, the CWFI time series exhibit different values on fire days than on all days. In addition, a percentile analysis was performed in order to determine the behaviour of index values corresponding to fire events falling into the megafire category. This analysis resulted in a set of critical thresholds based on percentiles. By utilising such thresholds, an initial framework of an early warning system has being established. By lowering the value of any of these thresholds, the number of hits could be increased until all extremes were captured (resulting in zero misses). However, in doing so, the number of false alarms tends to increase significantly. Consequently, an optimal trade-off between hits and false alarms has to be established when setting different (critical) CFWI thresholds.

Phasic and tonic neuron ensemble codes for stimulus-environment conjunctions in the lateral entorhinal cortex

PubMed Central

Pilkiw, Maryna; Insel, Nathan; Cui, Younghua; Finney, Caitlin; Morrissey, Mark D; Takehara-Nishiuchi, Kaori

2017-01-01

The lateral entorhinal cortex (LEC) is thought to bind sensory events with the environment where they took place. To compare the relative influence of transient events and temporally stable environmental stimuli on the firing of LEC cells, we recorded neuron spiking patterns in the region during blocks of a trace eyeblink conditioning paradigm performed in two environments and with different conditioning stimuli. Firing rates of some neurons were phasically selective for conditioned stimuli in a way that depended on which room the rat was in; nearly all neurons were tonically selective for environments in a way that depended on which stimuli had been presented in those environments. As rats moved from one environment to another, tonic neuron ensemble activity exhibited prospective information about the conditioned stimulus associated with the environment. Thus, the LEC formed phasic and tonic codes for event-environment associations, thereby accurately differentiating multiple experiences with overlapping features. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.28611.001 PMID:28682237

Simulation of wind-driven dispersion of fire pollutants in a street canyon using FDS.

PubMed

Pesic, Dusica J; Blagojevic, Milan Dj; Zivkovic, Nenad V

2014-01-01

Air quality in urban areas attracts great attention due to increasing pollutant emissions and their negative effects on human health and environment. Numerous studies, such as those by Mouilleau and Champassith (J Loss Prevent Proc 22(3): 316-323, 2009), Xie et al. (J Hydrodyn 21(1): 108-117, 2009), and Yassin (Environ Sci Pollut Res 20(6): 3975-3988, 2013) focus on the air pollutant dispersion with no buoyancy effect or weak buoyancy effect. A few studies, such as those by Hu et al. (J Hazard Mater 166(1): 394-406, 2009; J Hazard Mater 192(3): 940-948, 2011; J Civ Eng Manag (2013)) focus on the fire-induced dispersion of pollutants with heat buoyancy release rate in the range from 0.5 to 20 MW. However, the air pollution source might very often be concentrated and intensive, as a consequence of the hazardous materials fire. Namely, transportation of fuel through urban areas occurs regularly, because it is often impossible to find alternative supply routes. It is accompanied with the risk of fire accident occurrences. Accident prevention strategies require analysis of the worst scenarios in which fire products jeopardize the exposed population and environment. The aim of this article is to analyze the impact of wind flow on air pollution and human vulnerability to fire products in a street canyon. For simulation of the gasoline tanker truck fire as a result of a multivehicle accident, computational fluid dynamics large eddy simulation method has been used. Numerical results show that the fire products flow vertically upward, without touching the walls of the buildings in the absence of wind. However, when the wind velocity reaches the critical value, the products touch the walls of the buildings on both sides of the street canyon. The concentrations of carbon monoxide and soot decrease, whereas carbon dioxide concentration increases with the rise of height above the street canyon ground level. The longitudinal concentration of the pollutants inside the street increases with the rise of the wind velocity at the roof level of the street canyon.

Near-field emission profiling of tropical forest and Cerrado fires in Brazil during SAMBBA 2012

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hodgson, Amy K.; Morgan, William T.; O'Shea, Sebastian; Bauguitte, Stéphane; Allan, James D.; Darbyshire, Eoghan; Flynn, Michael J.; Liu, Dantong; Lee, James; Johnson, Ben; Haywood, Jim M.; Longo, Karla M.; Artaxo, Paulo E.; Coe, Hugh

2018-04-01

We profile trace gas and particulate emissions from near-field airborne measurements of discrete smoke plumes in Brazil during the 2012 biomass burning season. The South American Biomass Burning Analysis (SAMBBA) Project conducted during September and October 2012 sampled across two distinct fire regimes prevalent in the Amazon Basin. Combined measurements from a Compact Time-of-Flight Aerosol Mass Spectrometer (C-ToF-AMS) and a Single Particle Soot Photometer (SP2) are reported for the first time in a tropical biomass burning environment. Emissions from a mostly smouldering tropical forest wildfire in Rondônia state and numerous smaller flaming Cerrado fires in Tocantins state are presented. While the Cerrado fires appear to be representative of typical fire conditions in the existing literature, the tropical forest wildfire likely represents a more extreme example of biomass burning with a bias towards mostly smouldering emissions. We determined fire-integrated modified combustion efficiencies, emission ratios and emission factors for trace gas and particulate components for these two fire types, alongside aerosol microphysical properties. Seven times more black carbon was emitted from the Cerrado fires per unit of fuel combustion (EFBC of 0.13 ± 0.04 g kg-1) compared to the tropical forest fire (EFBC of 0.019 ± 0.006 g kg-1), and more than 6 times the amount of organic aerosol was emitted from the tropical forest fire per unit of fuel combustion (EFOM of 8.00 ± 2.53 g kg-1, EFOC of 5.00 ± 1.58 g kg-1) compared to the Cerrado fires (EFOM of 1.31 ± 0.42 g kg-1, EFOC of 0.82 ± 0.26 g kg-1). Particulate-phase species emitted from the fires sampled are generally lower than those reported in previous studies and in emission inventories, which is likely a combination of differences in fire combustion efficiency and fuel mixture, along with different measurement techniques. Previous modelling studies focussed on the biomass burning season in tropical South America have required significant scaling up of emissions to reproduce in situ and satellite aerosol concentrations over the region. Our results do not indicate that emission factors used in inventories are biased low, which could be one potential cause of the reported underestimates in modelling studies. This study supplements and updates trace gas and particulate emission factors for fire-type-specific biomass burning in Brazil for use in weather and climate models. The study illustrates that initial fire conditions can result in substantial differences in terms of their emitted chemical components, which can potentially perturb the Earth system.

Evaluating impacts of fire management strategies on native and invasive plants using an individual-based model

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gangur, Alexander N.; Fill, Jennifer M.; Northfield, Tobin D.; van de Wiel, Marco

2017-04-01

The capacity for species to coexist and potentially exclude one another can broadly be attributed to drivers that influence fitness differences (such as competitive ability) and niche differences (such as environmental change). These drivers, and thus the determinants of coexistence they influence, can interact and fluctuate both spatially and temporally. Understanding the spatiotemporal variation in niche and fitness differences in systems prone to fluctuating drivers, such as fire, can help to inform the management of invasive species. In the Cape floristic region of South Africa, invasive Pinus pinaster seedlings are strong competitors in the post-burn environment of the fire-driven Fynbos vegetation. In this, system native Protea spp. are especially vulnerable to unseasonal burns, but seasonal prescribed (Summer) burns are thought to present a high safety risk. Together, these issues have limited the appeal of prescribed burn management as an alternative to costly manual eradication of P. pinaster. Using a spatially-explicit field-of-neighbourhood individual-based model, we represent the drivers of spatiotemporal variation in niche differences (driven by fire regimes) and fitness differences (driven by competitive ability). In doing so, we evaluate optimal fire management strategies to a) control invasive P. pinaster in the Cape floristic region of South Africa, while b) minimizing deleterious effects of management on native Protea spp. The scarcity of appropriate data for model calibration has been problematic for models in invasion biology, but we use recent advances in Approximate Bayesian Computing techniques to overcome this limitation. We present early conclusions on the viability of prescribed burn management to control P. pinaster in South Africa.

A dendrochronology based fire history of Jeffry pine-mixed conifer forests in the Sierra San Pedro Martir, Mexico

Treesearch

Scott L. Stephens; Carl N. Skinner; Samantha J. Gill

2003-01-01

Conifer forests in northwestern Mexico have not experienced systematic fire suppression or logging, making them unique in western North America. Fire regimes of Pinus jeffreyi Grev. & Balf. mixed conifer forests in the Sierra San Pedro Martir, Baja California, Mexico, were determined by identifying 105 fire dates from 1034 fire scars in 105 specimens. Fires were...

Quantifying greenhouse gas emissions from coal fires using airborne and ground-based methods

USGS Publications Warehouse

Engle, M.A.; Radke, L.F.; Heffern, E.L.; O'Keefe, J.M.K.; Smeltzer, C.D.; Hower, J.C.; Hower, J.M.; Prakash, A.; Kolker, A.; Eatwell, R.J.; ter, Schure A.; Queen, G.; Aggen, K.L.; Stracher, G.B.; Henke, K.R.; Olea, R.A.; Roman-Colon, Y.

2011-01-01

Coal fires occur in all coal-bearing regions of the world and number, conservatively, in the thousands. These fires emit a variety of compounds including greenhouse gases. However, the magnitude of the contribution of combustion gases from coal fires to the environment is highly uncertain, because adequate data and methods for assessing emissions are lacking. This study demonstrates the ability to estimate CO2 and CH4 emissions for the Welch Ranch coal fire, Powder River Basin, Wyoming, USA, using two independent methods: (a) heat flux calculated from aerial thermal infrared imaging (3.7-4.4td-1 of CO2 equivalent emissions) and (b) direct, ground-based measurements (7.3-9.5td-1 of CO2 equivalent emissions). Both approaches offer the potential for conducting inventories of coal fires to assess their gas emissions and to evaluate and prioritize fires for mitigation. ?? 2011.

Quantifying greenhouse gas emissions from coal fires using airborne and ground-based methods

USGS Publications Warehouse

Engle, Mark A.; Radke, Lawrence F.; Heffern, Edward L.; O'Keefe, Jennifer M.K.; Smeltzer, Charles; Hower, James C.; Hower, Judith M.; Prakash, Anupma; Kolker, Allan; Eatwell, Robert J.; ter Schure, Arnout; Queen, Gerald; Aggen, Kerry L.; Stracher, Glenn B.; Henke, Kevin R.; Olea, Ricardo A.; Román-Colón, Yomayara

2011-01-01

Coal fires occur in all coal-bearing regions of the world and number, conservatively, in the thousands. These fires emit a variety of compounds including greenhouse gases. However, the magnitude of the contribution of combustion gases from coal fires to the environment is highly uncertain, because adequate data and methods for assessing emissions are lacking. This study demonstrates the ability to estimate CO2 and CH4 emissions for the Welch Ranch coal fire, Powder River Basin, Wyoming, USA, using two independent methods: (a) heat flux calculated from aerial thermal infrared imaging (3.7–4.4 t d−1 of CO2 equivalent emissions) and (b) direct, ground-based measurements (7.3–9.5 t d−1 of CO2 equivalent emissions). Both approaches offer the potential for conducting inventories of coal fires to assess their gas emissions and to evaluate and prioritize fires for mitigation.

Fire-related medical science

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Knight, Douglas R.

1987-01-01

Spacecraft fire safety may be improved by the use of a fire-retardant atmosphere in occupied spaces. Low concentrations of oxygen can protect humans from fire damage by reducing the rate and spread of combustion, but care must be taken to avoid the hypoxic effects of oxygen-lean atmospheres. Crews can live and work in 11 percent oxygen if barometric pressure were adjusted to maintain the partial pressure of oxygen above 16 kPa. Eleven percent oxygen should prevent most types of fires, since 15 percent oxygen retards the combustion of paper and 13 percent oxygen extinguishes pentane flames. Test results indicate that seated humans can perform mental tasks in atmospheres containing 11.5 percent oxygen. Although this strategy of fire safety is under consideration for submarines, it could be adapted to spacecraft once operational procedures define a maximum hyperbaric pressure and fire research defines the effects of reduced oxygen concentrations on combustion in low gravity environments.

New perspectives in fire management in South American savannas: The importance of intercultural governance.

PubMed

Mistry, Jayalaxshmi; Schmidt, Isabel Belloni; Eloy, Ludivine; Bilbao, Bibiana

2018-05-11

Wildfires continue to cause damage to property, livelihoods and environments around the world. Acknowledging that dealing with wildfires has to go beyond fire-fighting, governments in countries with fire-prone ecosystems have begun to recognize the multiple perspectives of landscape burning and the need to engage with local communities and their practices. In this perspective, we outline the experiences of Brazil and Venezuela, two countries where fire management has been highly contested, but where there have been recent advances in fire management approaches. Success of these new initiatives have been measured by the reduction in wildfire extent through prescribed burning, and the opening of a dialogue on fire management between government agencies and local communities. Yet, it is clear that further developments in community participation need to take place in order to avoid the appropriation of local knowledge systems by institutions, and to better reflect more equitable fire governance.

The cognitive nuances of surprising events: exposure to unexpected stimuli elicits firing variations in neurons of the dorsal CA1 hippocampus.

PubMed

Valenti, Ornella; Mikus, Nace; Klausberger, Thomas

2018-05-22

The ability to recognize novel situations is among the most fascinating and vital of the brain functions. A hypothesis posits that encoding of novelty is prompted by failures in expectancy, according to computation matching incoming information with stored events. Thus, unexpected changes in context are detected within the hippocampus and transferred to downstream structures, eliciting the arousal of the dopamine system. Nevertheless, the precise locus of detection is a matter of debate. The dorsal CA1 hippocampus (dCA1) appears as an ideal candidate for operating a mismatch computation and discriminating the occurrence of diverse stimuli within the same environment. In this study, we sought to determine dCA1 neuronal firing during the experience of novel stimuli embedded in familiar contexts. We performed population recordings while head-fixed mice navigated virtual environments. Three stimuli were employed, namely a novel pattern of visual cues, an odor, and a reward with enhanced valence. The encounter of unexpected events elicited profound variations in dCA1 that were assessed both as opposite rate directions and altered network connectivity. When experienced in sequence, novel stimuli elicited specific responses that often exhibited cross-sensitization. Short-latency, event-triggered responses were in accordance with the detection of novelty being computed within dCA1. We postulate that firing variations trigger neuronal disinhibition, and constitute a fundamental mechanism in the processing of unexpected events and in learning. Elucidating the mechanisms underlying detection and computation of novelty might help in understanding hippocampal-dependent cognitive dysfunctions associated with neuropathologies and psychiatric conditions.

Ecological divergence and evolutionary transition of resprouting types in Banksia attenuata.

PubMed

He, Tianhua

2014-08-01

Resprouting is a key functional trait that allows plants to survive diverse disturbances. The fitness benefits associated with resprouting include a rapid return to adult growth, early flowering, and setting seed. The resprouting responses observed following fire are varied, as are the ecological outcomes. Understanding the ecological divergence and evolutionary pathways of different resprouting types and how the environment and genetics interact to drive such morphological evolution represents an important, but under-studied, topic. In the present study, microsatellite markers and microevolutionary approaches were used to better understand: (1) whether genetic differentiation is related to morphological divergence among resprouting types and if so, whether there are any specific genetic variations associated with morphological divergence and (2) the evolutionary pathway of the transitions between two resprouting types in Banksia attenuata (epicormic resprouting from aerial stems or branch; resprouting from a underground lignotuber). The results revealed an association between population genetic differentiation and the morphological divergence of postfire resprouting types in B. attenuata. A microsatellite allele has been shown to be associated with epicormic populations. Approximate Bayesian Computation analysis revealed a likely evolutionary transition from epicormic to lignotuberous resprouting in B. attenuata. It is concluded that the postfire resprouting type in B. attenuata is likely determined by the fire's characteristics. The differentiated expression of postfire resprouting types in different environments is likely a consequence of local genetic adaptation. The capacity to shift the postfire resprouting type to adapt to diverse fire regimes is most likely the key factor explaining why B. attenuata is the most widespread member of the Banksia genus.

Trapped within the city: integrating demography, time since isolation and population-specific traits to assess the genetic effects of urbanization.

PubMed

Lourenço, André; Álvarez, David; Wang, Ian J; Velo-Antón, Guillermo

2017-03-01

Urbanization is a severe form of habitat fragmentation that can cause many species to be locally extirpated and many others to become trapped and isolated within an urban matrix. The role of drift in reducing genetic diversity and increasing genetic differentiation is well recognized in urban populations. However, explicit incorporation and analysis of the demographic and temporal factors promoting drift in urban environments are poorly studied. Here, we genotyped 15 microsatellites in 320 fire salamanders from the historical city of Oviedo (Est. 8th century) to assess the effects of time since isolation, demographic history (historical effective population size; N e ) and patch size on genetic diversity, population structure and contemporary N e . Our results indicate that urban populations of fire salamanders are highly differentiated, most likely due to the recent N e declines, as calculated in coalescence analyses, concomitant with the urban development of Oviedo. However, urbanization only caused a small loss of genetic diversity. Regression modelling showed that patch size was positively associated with contemporary N e , while we found only moderate support for the effects of demographic history when excluding populations with unresolved history. This highlights the interplay between different factors in determining current genetic diversity and structure. Overall, the results of our study on urban populations of fire salamanders provide some of the very first insights into the mechanisms affecting changes in genetic diversity and population differentiation via drift in urban environments, a crucial subject in a world where increasing urbanization is forecasted. © 2017 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Fire, Carbon and Climate Change in Boreal Forests

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Flannigan, M. D.; Amiro, B. D.; Logan, K. A.

2005-12-01

Disturbances are the major stand-renewing agents for much of the circumboreal forest. In Canada, fire has received much of the attention in carbon cycle science because it affects about 3 million ha of Canadian forest annually, impacts air quality, and can threaten life, property and infrastructure. Fire affects the carbon balance through three processes. First, carbon and other greenhouse gases are emitted to the atmosphere during the combustion process. We estimate this to average about 27 Tg C/year in Canada over the past 40 years, which is close to 20% of industrial carbon emissions. However, in some years this can exceed 100 Tg C. Efforts are underway to estimate global fire activity and greenhouse gas emissions using observations, remote sensing and modelling. The second process is the decomposition of fire-killed vegetation. This forms a pool of coarse woody debris that can take decades to decompose, or can be quite rapid, depending on the post-fire environment. The third process is succession of vegetation following fire, a dynamic process that involves the interplay among species establishment and competition. Weather and climate affects all of these processes. Estimates of the future environment indicate that much of boreal Canada will experience warmer and drier conditions, although there will be regional differences and transient effects. The projections suggest that we may experience a doubling of area burned over the next century because of anthropogenic climate changes. This may have further implications to the global carbon budget by increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations. This increase in fire activity may lead to a positive feedback cycle with the increased release of greenhouse gases. A run-away scenario is unlikely because young successional boreal vegetation often does not burn as readily and would limit the positive feedback cycle. Also, changes to the forest composition following fire increases surface albedo and alters the energy balance; effects that may cause climate cooling. However, the impacts of landscape feedbacks and human intervention limiting future fire are not well known.

Toxicity of carbon monoxide hydrogen cyanide gas mixtures : exposure concentration, time to incapacitation, carboxyhemoglobin and blood cyanide parameters.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1994-04-01

During aircraft interior fires, carbon monoxide (CO) and hydrogen cyanide (HCN) are produced in sufficient amounts to cause incapacitation and death. Time-to-incapacitation (ti) is a practical parameter for estimating escape time in fire environments...

A new tool for fire managers: An electronic duff moisture meter

Treesearch

Peter R. Robichaud; Jim Bilskie

2004-01-01

Prescribed fires are increasingly being used to reduce hazardous fuels, a major objective of the National Fire Plan. Despite advancing technology and ever-improving models, fire managers still find it challenging to determine the right time for a prescribed burn.

Potential production of palm oil-based foaming agent as fire extinguisher of peatlands in Indonesia: Literature review

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Subekti, P.; Hambali, E.; Suryani, A.; Suryadarma, P.

2017-05-01

This study aims to analyze the potential aplication of of palm oil-based foaming agent as peat fires fighter in Indonesia. From literature review, it has been known that the foaming agent able to form foam to extinguish fire, wrap and refrigerate the burning peat. It is necessary to develop the production and application of foaming agent in Indonesia because peat fires occur almost every year that caused smoke haze. Potential raw material for the production of environmental friendly foaming agent as foam extinguishing for peat fires in Indonesia aong other is palm oil due to abundant availability, sustainable, and foam product easily degraded in the environment of the burnt areas. Production of foaming agent as fire-fighting in Indonesia is one alternative to reduce the time to control the fire and smog disaster impact. Application of palm oil as a raw material for fire-fighting is contribute to increase the value added and the development of palm oil downstream industry.

Quantitative Risk Modeling of Fire on the International Space Station

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Castillo, Theresa; Haught, Megan

2014-01-01

The International Space Station (ISS) Program has worked to prevent fire events and to mitigate their impacts should they occur. Hardware is designed to reduce sources of ignition, oxygen systems are designed to control leaking, flammable materials are prevented from flying to ISS whenever possible, the crew is trained in fire response, and fire response equipment improvements are sought out and funded. Fire prevention and mitigation are a top ISS Program priority - however, programmatic resources are limited; thus, risk trades are made to ensure an adequate level of safety is maintained onboard the ISS. In support of these risk trades, the ISS Probabilistic Risk Assessment (PRA) team has modeled the likelihood of fire occurring in the ISS pressurized cabin, a phenomenological event that has never before been probabilistically modeled in a microgravity environment. This paper will discuss the genesis of the ISS PRA fire model, its enhancement in collaboration with fire experts, and the results which have informed ISS programmatic decisions and will continue to be used throughout the life of the program.

Science and technology issues in spacecraft fire safety

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Friedman, Robert; Sacksteder, Kurt R.

1987-01-01

The space station, a permanently-inhabited orbiting laboratory, places new demands on spacecraft fire safety. Long-duration missions may call for more-constrained fire controls, but the accessibility of the space station to a variety of users may call for less-restrictive measures. This paper discusses fire safety issues through a review of the state of the art and a presentation of key findings from a recent NASA Lewis Research Center Workshop. The subjects covered are the fundamental science of low-gravity combustion and the technology advances in fire detection, extinguishment, materials assessment, and atmosphere selection. Key concerns are for the adoption of a fire-safe atmosphere and the substitution for the effective but toxic extinguishant, halon 1301. The fire safety studies and reviews provide several recommendations for further action. One is the expanded research in combustion, sensors, and materials in the low-gravity environment of space. Another is the development of generalized fire-safety standards for spacecraft through cooperative endeavors with aerospace and outside Government and industry sources.

Emissions from an automobile fire.

PubMed

Lönnermark, Anders; Blomqvist, Per

2006-02-01

The emissions from automobile fires have been investigated. The main gas phase components were analysed in small-scale tests with representative material from an automobile. A more detailed investigation of full-scale simulated automobile fires was also conducted, including the characterisation of gas phase components, particulates and run-off water from extinguishing activities. Three separate full scale fire tests have been characterised: a fire ignited and developed in the engine compartment; a fire ignited inside the coupé, that was extinguished in the early stages; and a similar fire ignited inside the coupé that was allowed to spread until the entire vehicle was involved in the fire. The quantitative analysis of the smoke gases from the full-scale fires showed that emissions with a potentially negative impact on the environment, or chronic toxic effect on humans, were produced in significant quantities. These emissions included HCl, SO2, VOCs (e.g. benzene), PAHs, and PCDDs/PCDFs. Analysis of run-off water indicated that it was severely contaminated, containing elevated levels of both organic compounds and metals. Comparison with data from other vehicle fires found in the literature shows that contamination by lead, copper, zinc, and antimony appears to be significant in water run-off from these types of fires.

Health Impacts of Climate Change-Induced Subzero Temperature Fires.

PubMed

Metallinou, Maria-Monika; Log, Torgrim

2017-07-20

General fire risk and the special risk related to cold climate cellulosic drying processes are outlined. Four recent subzero temperatures fires are studied with respect to health impacts: a wooden village fire, a single wood structure fire, a wildland urban interface (WUI) fire and a huge wildland fire. The health impacts range from stress related to loss of jobs, psychological effects of lost possessions, exposure to smoke and heat as well as immediate, or delayed, loss of lives. These four fires resulted in 32 fatalities, 385 persons hospitalized for shorter or longer periods, 104 structures lost and 1015 km² of wildland burned north of, and just south of, the Arctic Circle. It is shown that the combination of subzero temperature dry weather, strong winds, changing agricultural activities and declining snowpack may lead to previously anticipated threats to people and the environment. There are reasons to believe that these fires are a result of the ongoing climate changes. Risk impacts are discussed. Rural districts and/or vulnerable populations seem to be most affected. Training methods to identify and better monitor critical fire risk parameters are suggested to mitigate the health impacts of a possibly increasing number of such fires.

Health Impacts of Climate Change-Induced Subzero Temperature Fires

PubMed Central

Metallinou, Maria-Monika; Log, Torgrim

2017-01-01

General fire risk and the special risk related to cold climate cellulosic drying processes are outlined. Four recent subzero temperatures fires are studied with respect to health impacts: a wooden village fire, a single wood structure fire, a wildland urban interface (WUI) fire and a huge wildland fire. The health impacts range from stress related to loss of jobs, psychological effects of lost possessions, exposure to smoke and heat as well as immediate, or delayed, loss of lives. These four fires resulted in 32 fatalities, 385 persons hospitalized for shorter or longer periods, 104 structures lost and 1015 km2 of wildland burned north of, and just south of, the Arctic Circle. It is shown that the combination of subzero temperature dry weather, strong winds, changing agricultural activities and declining snowpack may lead to previously anticipated threats to people and the environment. There are reasons to believe that these fires are a result of the ongoing climate changes. Risk impacts are discussed. Rural districts and/or vulnerable populations seem to be most affected. Training methods to identify and better monitor critical fire risk parameters are suggested to mitigate the health impacts of a possibly increasing number of such fires. PMID:28726752

Fractionation of metals by sequential extraction procedures (BCR and Tessier) in soil exposed to fire of wide temperature range

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fajkovic, Hana; Rončević, Sanda; Nemet, Ivan; Prohić, Esad; Leontić-Vazdar, Dana

2017-04-01

Forest fire presents serious problem, especially in Mediterranean Region. Effects of fire are numerous, from climate change and deforestation to loss of soil organic matter and changes in soil properties. One of the effects, not well documented, is possible redistribution and/or remobilisation of pollutants previously deposited in the soil, due to the new physical and chemical soil properties and changes in equilibrium conditions. For understanding and predicting possible redistribution and/or remobilisation of potential pollutants from soil, affected by fire different in temperature, several laboratory investigations were carried out. To evaluate the influence of organic matter on soil under fire, three soil samples were analysed and compared: (a) the one with added coniferous organic matter; (b) deciduous organic matter (b) and (c) soil without additional organic matter. Type of organic matter is closely related to pH of soil, as pH is influencing the mobility of some pollutants, e.g. metals. For that reason pH was also measured through all experimental steps. Each of mentioned soil samples (a, b and c) were heated at 1+3 different temperatures (25°C, 200°C, 500°C and 850°C). After heating, whereby fire effect on soil was simulated, samples were analysed by BCR protocol with the addition of a first step of sequential extraction procedure by Tessier and analysis of residual by aqua regia. Element fractionation of heavy metals by this procedure was used to determine the amounts of selected elements (Al, Cd, Cr, Co, Cu, Fe, Mn, Ni, Pb and Zn). Selected metal concentrations were determined using inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectrometer. Further on, loss of organic matter was calculated after each heating procedure as well as the mineral composition. The mineral composition was determined using an X-ray diffraction. From obtained results, it can be concluded that temperature has an influence on concentration of elements in specific step of sequential extraction procedures. The first step of Tessier and BCR extraction of samples heated at 250°C and 500°C showed increasing trend of elemental concentrations. Results of these steps are especially important since they indicate mobile fraction of the elements (exchangeable, water- and acid-soluble fraction), which can easily affect the environment. Extraction procedures of samples combusted at 850°C showed that decrease in measured elemental content occurred. Some correlation is also noticed between type of organic matter, pH and concentration of analysed elements.

Detection of Wildfires with Artificial Neural Networks

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Umphlett, B.; Leeman, J.; Morrissey, M. L.

2011-12-01

Currently fire detection for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) using satellite data is accomplished with algorithms and error checking human analysts. Artificial neural networks (ANNs) have been shown to be more accurate than algorithms or statistical methods for applications dealing with multiple datasets of complex observed data in the natural sciences. ANNs also deal well with multiple data sources that are not all equally reliable or equally informative to the problem. An ANN was tested to evaluate its accuracy in detecting wildfires utilizing polar orbiter numerical data from the Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR). Datasets containing locations of known fires were gathered from the NOAA's polar orbiting satellites via the Comprehensive Large Array-data Stewardship System (CLASS). The data was then calibrated and navigation corrected using the Environment for Visualizing Images (ENVI). Fires were located with the aid of shapefiles generated via ArcGIS. Afterwards, several smaller ten pixel by ten pixel datasets were created for each fire (using the ENVI corrected data). Several datasets were created for each fire in order to vary fire position and avoid training the ANN to look only at fires in the center of an image. Datasets containing no fires were also created. A basic pattern recognition neural network was established with the MATLAB neural network toolbox. The datasets were then randomly separated into categories used to train, validate, and test the ANN. To prevent over fitting of the data, the mean squared error (MSE) of the network was monitored and training was stopped when the MSE began to rise. Networks were tested using each channel of the AVHRR data independently, channels 3a and 3b combined, and all six channels. The number of hidden neurons for each input set was also varied between 5-350 in steps of 5 neurons. Each configuration was run 10 times, totaling about 4,200 individual network evaluations. Thirty network parameters were recorded to characterize performance. These parameters were plotted with various data display techniques to determine which network configuration was not only most accurate in fire classification, but also the most computationally efficient. The most accurate fire classification network used all six channels of AVHRR data to achieve an accuracy ranging from 73-90%.

Contribution of suppression difficulty and lessons learned in forecasting fire suppression operations productivity: A methodological approach

Treesearch

Francisco Rodríguez y Silva; Armando González-Cabán

2016-01-01

We propose an economic analysis using utility and productivity, and efficiency theories to provide fire managers a decision support tool to determine the most efficient fire management programs levels. By incorporating managers’ accumulated fire suppression experiences (capitalized experience) in the analysis we help fire managers...

Entrainment regimes and flame characteristics of wildland fires

Treesearch

Ralph M. Nelson; Bret W. Butler; David R. Weise

2012-01-01

This paper reports results from a study of the flame characteristics of 22 wind-aided pine litter fires in a laboratory wind tunnel and 32 field fires in southern rough and litter-grass fuels. Flame characteristic and fire behaviour data from these fires, simple theoretical flame models and regression techniques are used to determine whether the data support the...

Beyond "fire temperatures": calibrating thermocouple probes and modeling their response to surface fires in hardwood fuels

Treesearch

Anthony S. Bova; Matthew B. Dickinson

2008-01-01

The maximum temperatures of thermocouples, temperature-sensitive paints, and calorimeters exposed to flames in wildland fires are often called "fire temperatures" but are determined as much by the properties and deployment of the measurement devices as by the fires themselves. Rather than report device temperatures that are not generally comparable among...

Two centuries of fire in a southwestern Virginia Pinus pungens community

Treesearch

E. K. Sutherland; H. Grissino-Mayer; C. A. Woodhouse; W. W. Covington; S. Horn; L. Huckaby; R. Kerr; J. Kush; M. Moore; T. Plumb

1995-01-01

Fire exclusion in fire-dependent forest communities can alter stand structure and composition. The objective was to construct a fire history of two Pinus pungens Lamb. communities growing in southwestern Virgina. Treering analysis of fire-scarred P. pungens specimens and a tree survey were used to determine species composition and age distributions. From 1798-1944,...

Aids to determining fuel models for estimating fire behavior

Treesearch

Hal E. Anderson

1982-01-01

Presents photographs of wildland vegetation appropriate for the 13 fuel models used in mathematical models of fire behavior. Fuel model descriptions include fire behavior associated with each fuel and its physical characteristics. A similarity chart cross-references the 13 fire behavior fuel models to the 20 fuel models used in the National Fire Danger Rating System....

The relationship of large fire occurrence with drought and fire danger indices in the western USA, 1984-2008: The role of temporal scale

Treesearch

Karin L. Riley; John T. Abatzoglou; Isaac C. Grenfell; Anna E. Klene; Faith Ann Heinsch

2013-01-01

The relationship between large fire occurrence and drought has important implications for fire prediction under current and future climates. This study’s primary objective was to evaluate correlations between drought and fire-danger- rating indices representing short- and long-term drought, to determine which had the strongest relationships with large fire occurrence...

Potential shifts in dominant forest cover in interior Alaska driven by variations in fire severity

Treesearch

K. Barrett; A.D. McGuire; E.E. Hoy; E.S. Kasischke

2011-01-01

Large fire years in which >1% of the landscape burns are becoming more frequent in the Alaskan (USA) interior, with four large fire years in the past 10 years, and 79000 km2 (17% of the region) burned since 2000. We modeled fire severity conditions for the entire area burned in large fires during a large fire year (2004) to determine the...

Determination of the natural convection coefficient in low-gravity

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Goldmeer, J.; Motevalli, V.; Haghdoust, M.; Jumper, G.

1992-01-01

Fire safety is an important issue in the current space program; ignition in low-g needs to be studied. The reduction in the gravitational acceleration causes changes in the ignition process. This paper examines the effect of gravity on natural convection, which is one of the important parameters in the ignition process. The NASA-Lewis 2.2 Second Drop Tower provided the low-gravity environment for the experiments. A series of experiments was conducted to measure the temperature of a small copper plate which was heated by a high intensity lamp. These experiments verified that in low-gravity the plate temperature increased faster than in the corresponding 1-g cases, and that the natural convection coefficient rapidly decreased in the low-gravity environment.

Lightweight engine containment. [Kevlar shielding

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Weaver, A. T.

1977-01-01

Kevlar fabric styles and weaves were studied, as well as methods of application for advanced gas turbine engines. The Kevlar material was subjected to high speed impacts by simple projectiles fired from a rifle, as well as more complex shapes such as fan blades released from gas turbine rotors in a spin pit. Just contained data was developed for a variety of weave and/or application techniques, and a comparative containment weight efficiency was established for Kevlar containment applications. The data generated during these tests is being incorporated into an analytical design system so that blade containment trade-off studies between Kevlar and metal case engine structures can be made. Laboratory tests and engine environment tests were performed to determine the survivability of Kevlar in a gas turbine environment.

The abrupt development of adult-like grid cell firing in the medial entorhinal cortex

PubMed Central

Wills, Thomas J.; Barry, Caswell; Cacucci, Francesca

2012-01-01

Understanding the development of the neural circuits subserving specific cognitive functions such as navigation remains a central problem in neuroscience. Here, we characterize the development of grid cells in the medial entorhinal cortex, which, by nature of their regularly spaced firing fields, are thought to provide a distance metric to the hippocampal neural representation of space. Grid cells emerge at the time of weaning in the rat, at around 3 weeks of age. We investigated whether grid cells in young rats are functionally equivalent to those observed in the adult as soon as they appear, or if instead they follow a gradual developmental trajectory. We find that, from the very youngest ages at which reproducible grid firing is observed (postnatal day 19): grid cells display adult-like firing fields that tessellate to form a coherent map of the local environment; that this map is universal, maintaining its internal structure across different environments; and that grid cells in young rats, as in adults, also encode a representation of direction and speed. To further investigate the developmental processes leading up to the appearance of grid cells, we present data from individual medial entorhinal cortex cells recorded across more than 1 day, spanning the period before and after the grid firing pattern emerged. We find that increasing spatial stability of firing was correlated with increasing gridness. PMID:22557949

Use of treated woods in roof assembly.

PubMed

Edlich, Richard F; Winters, Kathryne L; Long, William B; Gubler, K Dean; Britt, L D

2005-01-01

On February 12, 2002, the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced a voluntary decision by industry to move consumer use of treated lumber products away from a variety of pressure-treated wood that contains Arsenate (As) by December 31, 2003, in favor of new alternative wood preservatives. It is the purpose of this report to outline legislative efforts to ban the use of chromated copper arsenate (CCA)-treated wood for residential roofing in the State of Oregon. At the time that the legislation was introduced, it was coincidental that the National Roofing Contractors Association (NRCA) recommended that CCA-treated wood should not be used in residential roofing. A summary of the report is included in this review. Finally, we discuss some of the potentially harmful environmental hazards of wood preservatives on the environment. In addition to the toxicity of pressure-treated wood on our environment, we point out that wood as well as pressure-treated wood assemblies are highly flammable. Consequently, we recommend the use of residential roofing systems that have Class A fire protection for the homeowner. Because residential roof fires remain a life-threatening danger to residential homeowners in the United States, we describe a national fire prevention program for reducing residential roof fires by use of an Underwriters Laboratories Inc. (UL) and National Fire Protection Association Class A fire-rated roof system.

Fire History from Life-History: Determining the Fire Regime that a Plant Community Is Adapted Using Life-Histories

PubMed Central

Armstrong, Graeme; Phillips, Ben

2012-01-01

Wildfire is a fundamental disturbance process in many ecological communities, and is critical in maintaining the structure of some plant communities. In the past century, changes in global land use practices have led to changes in fire regimes that have radically altered the composition of many plant communities. As the severe biodiversity impacts of inappropriate fire management regimes are recognized, attempts are being made to manage fires within a more ‘natural’ regime. In this aim, the focus has typically been on determining the fire regime to which the community has adapted. Here we take a subtly different approach and focus on the probability of a patch being burnt. We hypothesize that competing sympatric taxa from different plant functional groups are able to coexist due to the stochasticity of the fire regime, which creates opportunities in both time and space that are exploited differentially by each group. We exploit this situation to find the fire probability at which three sympatric grasses, from different functional groups, are able to co-exist. We do this by parameterizing a spatio-temporal simulation model with the life-history strategies of the three species and then search for the fire frequency and scale at which they are able to coexist when in competition. The simulation gives a clear result that these species only coexist across a very narrow range of fire probabilities centred at 0.2. Conversely, fire scale was found only to be important at very large scales. Our work demonstrates the efficacy of using competing sympatric species with different regeneration niches to determine the probability of fire in any given patch. Estimating this probability allows us to construct an expected historical distribution of fire return intervals for the community; a critical resource for managing fire-driven biodiversity in the face of a growing carbon economy and ongoing climate change. PMID:22363670

Post-Fire Recovery of Eco-Hydrologic Behavior Given Historic and Projected Climate Variability in California Mediterranean Type Environments

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Seaby, L. P.; Tague, C. L.; Hope, A. S.

2006-12-01

The Mediterranean type environments (MTEs) of California are characterized by a distinct wet and dry season and high variability in inter-annual climate. Water limitation in MTEs makes eco-hydrological processes highly sensitive to both climate variability and frequent fire disturbance. This research modeled post-fire eco- hydrologic behavior under historical and moderate and extreme scenarios of future climate in a semi-arid chaparral dominated southern California MTE. We used a physically-based, spatially-distributed, eco- hydrological model (RHESSys - Regional Hydro-Ecologic Simulation System), to capture linkages between water and vegetation response to the combined effects of fire and historic and future climate variability. We found post-fire eco-hydrologic behavior to be strongly influenced by the episodic nature of MTE climate, which intensifies under projected climate change. Higher rates of post-fire net primary productivity were found under moderate climate change, while more extreme climate change produced water stressed conditions which were less favorable for vegetation productivity. Precipitation variability in the historic record follows the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO), and these inter-annual climate characteristics intensify under climate change. Inter-annual variation in streamflow follows these precipitation patterns. Post-fire streamflow and carbon cycling trajectories are strongly dependent on climate characteristics during the first 5 years following fire, and historic intra-climate variability during this period tends to overwhelm longer term trends and variation that might be attributable to climate change. Results have implications for water resource availability, vegetation type conversion from shrubs to grassland, and changes in ecosystem structure and function.

The influence of leaf morphology on litter flammability and its utility for interpreting palaeofire

PubMed Central

2016-01-01

Studies of palaeofire rely on quantifying the abundance of fossil charcoals in sediments to estimate changes in fire activity. However, gaining an understanding of the behaviour of palaeofires is also essential if we are to determine the palaeoecological impact of wildfires. Here, I use experimental approaches to explore relationships between litter fire behaviour and leaf traits that are observable in the fossil record. Fire calorimetry was used to assess the flammability of 15 species of conifer litter and indicated that leaf morphology related to litter bulk density and fuel load that determined the duration of burning and the total energy released. These data were applied to a fossil case study that couples estimates of palaeolitter fire behaviour to charcoal-based estimates of fire activity and observations of palaeoecological changes. The case study reveals that significant changes in fire activity and behaviour likely fed back to determine ecosystem composition. This work highlights that we can recognize and measure plant traits in the fossil record that relate to fire behaviour and therefore that further research is warranted towards estimating palaeofire behaviour as it can enhance our ability to interpret the palaeoecological impact of palaeofires throughout Earth's long evolutionary history. This article is part of the themed issue ‘The interaction of fire and mankind’. PMID:27216520

The influence of leaf morphology on litter flammability and its utility for interpreting palaeofire.

PubMed

Belcher, Claire M

2016-06-05

Studies of palaeofire rely on quantifying the abundance of fossil charcoals in sediments to estimate changes in fire activity. However, gaining an understanding of the behaviour of palaeofires is also essential if we are to determine the palaeoecological impact of wildfires. Here, I use experimental approaches to explore relationships between litter fire behaviour and leaf traits that are observable in the fossil record. Fire calorimetry was used to assess the flammability of 15 species of conifer litter and indicated that leaf morphology related to litter bulk density and fuel load that determined the duration of burning and the total energy released. These data were applied to a fossil case study that couples estimates of palaeolitter fire behaviour to charcoal-based estimates of fire activity and observations of palaeoecological changes. The case study reveals that significant changes in fire activity and behaviour likely fed back to determine ecosystem composition. This work highlights that we can recognize and measure plant traits in the fossil record that relate to fire behaviour and therefore that further research is warranted towards estimating palaeofire behaviour as it can enhance our ability to interpret the palaeoecological impact of palaeofires throughout Earth's long evolutionary history.This article is part of the themed issue 'The interaction of fire and mankind'. © 2016 The Author(s).

Improving rangeland seeding success in post-fire water repellent soil using surfactant seed coating technology

USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

Severe disturbance from catastrophic wildfires often requires that native plant materials be reintroduced through reseeding, but the success rate of these restoration efforts in arid environments is notoriously low. Post-fire soil water repellency can limit reseeding success by decreasing soil moist...

Phytoremediation of Pb in the sediment of a mangrove ecosystem

USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

Lead (Pb) is a naturally occurring element that poses environmental risks and hazards if present at elevated concentration. It is being released into the environment because of industrial uses, combustion of fossils fuels and from coal-fired power plants. Coal-fired power plants can discharge hazard...

The Cleveland Aircraft Fire Tests

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Brenneman, James J.; Heine, Donald A.

1968-01-01

On June 30 and July 1, 1966, tests were conducted to evaluate high expansion foam's ability to extend the time for which an aircraft passenger cabin environment would remain survivable during a post-crash fire. While some results tend to confirm those of similar tests, others may shed new light on the problem.

40 CFR 75.14 - Specific provisions for monitoring opacity.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-07-01

... PROGRAMS (CONTINUED) CONTINUOUS EMISSION MONITORING Monitoring Provisions § 75.14 Specific provisions for monitoring opacity. (a) Coal-fired units and oil-fired units. The owner or operator shall meet the general... 40 Protection of Environment 16 2010-07-01 2010-07-01 false Specific provisions for monitoring...

40 CFR 75.14 - Specific provisions for monitoring opacity.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-07-01

... PROGRAMS (CONTINUED) CONTINUOUS EMISSION MONITORING Monitoring Provisions § 75.14 Specific provisions for monitoring opacity. (a) Coal-fired units and oil-fired units. The owner or operator shall meet the general... 40 Protection of Environment 17 2014-07-01 2014-07-01 false Specific provisions for monitoring...

40 CFR 75.14 - Specific provisions for monitoring opacity.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-07-01

... PROGRAMS (CONTINUED) CONTINUOUS EMISSION MONITORING Monitoring Provisions § 75.14 Specific provisions for monitoring opacity. (a) Coal-fired units and oil-fired units. The owner or operator shall meet the general... 40 Protection of Environment 16 2011-07-01 2011-07-01 false Specific provisions for monitoring...

40 CFR 75.14 - Specific provisions for monitoring opacity.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-07-01

... PROGRAMS (CONTINUED) CONTINUOUS EMISSION MONITORING Monitoring Provisions § 75.14 Specific provisions for monitoring opacity. (a) Coal-fired units and oil-fired units. The owner or operator shall meet the general... 40 Protection of Environment 17 2012-07-01 2012-07-01 false Specific provisions for monitoring...

40 CFR 75.14 - Specific provisions for monitoring opacity.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-07-01

... PROGRAMS (CONTINUED) CONTINUOUS EMISSION MONITORING Monitoring Provisions § 75.14 Specific provisions for monitoring opacity. (a) Coal-fired units and oil-fired units. The owner or operator shall meet the general... 40 Protection of Environment 17 2013-07-01 2013-07-01 false Specific provisions for monitoring...

Using Rare Earth Element (REE) tracers to identify preferential micro-sites of post-fire aeolian erosion

USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

Plant communities in desert environments are spatially anisotropic and nutrient islands develop below plant canopies that enhance plant growth and reinforce the spatial anisotropy. Catastrophic disturbance that removes the vegetation such as fire or drought can result in the release of the trapped ...

40 CFR 265.56 - Emergency procedures.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-07-01

... FACILITIES Contingency Plan and Emergency Procedures § 265.56 Emergency procedures. (a) Whenever there is an... with designated response roles if their help is needed. (b) Whenever there is a release, fire, or... possible hazards to human health or the environment that may result from the release, fire, or explosion...

40 CFR 264.56 - Emergency procedures.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-07-01

... Contingency Plan and Emergency Procedures § 264.56 Emergency procedures. (a) Whenever there is an imminent or... designated response roles if their help is needed. (b) Whenever there is a release, fire, or explosion, the... human health or the environment that may result from the release, fire, or explosion. This assessment...

40 CFR 264.56 - Emergency procedures.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-07-01

... Contingency Plan and Emergency Procedures § 264.56 Emergency procedures. (a) Whenever there is an imminent or... designated response roles if their help is needed. (b) Whenever there is a release, fire, or explosion, the... human health or the environment that may result from the release, fire, or explosion. This assessment...

40 CFR 264.56 - Emergency procedures.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-07-01

... Contingency Plan and Emergency Procedures § 264.56 Emergency procedures. (a) Whenever there is an imminent or... designated response roles if their help is needed. (b) Whenever there is a release, fire, or explosion, the... human health or the environment that may result from the release, fire, or explosion. This assessment...

40 CFR 265.56 - Emergency procedures.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-07-01

... FACILITIES Contingency Plan and Emergency Procedures § 265.56 Emergency procedures. (a) Whenever there is an... with designated response roles if their help is needed. (b) Whenever there is a release, fire, or... possible hazards to human health or the environment that may result from the release, fire, or explosion...

40 CFR 264.56 - Emergency procedures.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-07-01

... Contingency Plan and Emergency Procedures § 264.56 Emergency procedures. (a) Whenever there is an imminent or... designated response roles if their help is needed. (b) Whenever there is a release, fire, or explosion, the... human health or the environment that may result from the release, fire, or explosion. This assessment...

40 CFR 265.56 - Emergency procedures.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-07-01

... FACILITIES Contingency Plan and Emergency Procedures § 265.56 Emergency procedures. (a) Whenever there is an... with designated response roles if their help is needed. (b) Whenever there is a release, fire, or... possible hazards to human health or the environment that may result from the release, fire, or explosion...

40 CFR 265.56 - Emergency procedures.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-07-01

... FACILITIES Contingency Plan and Emergency Procedures § 265.56 Emergency procedures. (a) Whenever there is an... with designated response roles if their help is needed. (b) Whenever there is a release, fire, or... possible hazards to human health or the environment that may result from the release, fire, or explosion...

Acute oral toxicities of wildland fire control chemicals to birds

USGS Publications Warehouse

Vyas, N.B.; Spann, J.W.; Hill, E.F.

2009-01-01

Wildland fire control chemicals are released into the environment by aerial and ground applications to manage rangeland, grassland, and forest fires. Acute oral 24 h median lethal dosages (LD50) for three fire retardants (Fire-Trol GTS-R?, Phos-Chek D-75F?, and Fire-Trol LCG-R?) and two Class A fire suppressant foams (Silv-Ex? and Phos-Chek WD881?) were estimated for northern bobwhites, Colinus virginianus, American kestrels, Falco sparverius, and red-winged blackbirds, Agelaius phoeniceus. The LD50s of all chemicals for the bobwhites and red-winged blackbirds and for kestrels dosed with Phos-Chek WD881? and Silv-Ex? were above the predetermined 2000 mg chemical/kg body mass regulatory limit criteria for acute oral toxicity. The LD50s were not quantifiable for kestrels dosed with Fire-Trol GTS-R?, Phos-Chek D-75F?, and Fire-Trol LCG-R? because of the number of birds which regurgitated the dosage. These chemicals appear to be of comparatively low order of acute oral toxicity to the avian species tested.

Competing consumers: contrasting the patterns and impacts of fire and mammalian herbivory in Africa

PubMed Central

Archibald, Sally

2016-01-01

Fire and herbivory are the two consumers of above-ground biomass globally. They have contrasting impacts as they differ in terms of selectivity and temporal occurrence. Here, we integrate continental-scale data on fire and herbivory in Africa to explore (i) how environmental drivers constrain these two consumers and (ii) the degree to which each consumer affects the other. Environments conducive to mammalian herbivory are not necessarily the same as those conducive to fire, although their spheres of influence do overlap—especially in grassy ecosystems which are known for their frequent fires and abundance of large mammalian herbivores. Interactions between fire and herbivory can be competitive, facultative or antagonistic, and we explore this with reference to the potential for alternative ecosystem states. Although fire removes orders of magnitude more biomass than herbivory their methane emissions are very similar, and in the past, herbivores probably emitted more methane than fire. We contrast the type of herbivory and fire in different ecosystems to define ‘consumer-realms’. This article is part of the themed issue ‘Tropical grassy biomes: linking ecology, human use and conservation’. PMID:27502374

Premixed Atmosphere and Convection Influences on Flame Inhibition and Combustion (Pacific)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Honda, Linton K.; Ronney, Paul D.

1997-01-01

Flame spread over flat solid fuel beds is a useful paradigm for studying the behavior of more complex two-phase nonpremixed flames. For practical applications, two of the most important elements of flame spreading are the effects of (1) the ambient atmosphere (e.g. pressure and composition) and (2) the flow environment on the spread rate and extinction conditions. Concerning (1), studies of flame spread in vitiated air and non-standard atmospheres such as those found in undersea vessels and spacecraft are particularly important for the assessment of fire hazards in these environments as well as determination of the effectiveness of fire suppressants. Concerning (2), the flow environment may vary widely even when no forced flow is present because of buoyancy effects. Consequently, the goal of this work is to employ microgravity (micro g) experiments to extend previous studies of the effects of ambient atmosphere and the flow environment on flame spread through the use of microgravity (micro g) experiments. Because of the considerable differences between upward (concurrent-flow) and downward (opposed-flow) flame spread at 1g (Williams, 1976, Fernandez-Pello, 1984), in this work both upward and downward 1g spread are tested. Two types of changes to the oxidizing atmosphere are considered in this work. One is the addition of sub-flammability-limit concentrations of a gaseous fuel ('partially premixed' atmospheres). This is of interest because in fires in enclosures, combustion may occur under poorly ventilated conditions, so that oxygen is partially depleted from the air and is replaced by combustible gases such as fuel vapors, H2 or CO. Subsequent fire spread over the solid fuel could occur under conditions of varying oxygen and gaseous fuel content. The potential significance of flame spread under vitiated or partially premixed conditions has been noted previously (Beyler, 1984). The second change is the diluent type, which affects the radiative properties of the mixture as well as the Lewis number (Le) of the reactants in the atmosphere, which for oxygen is defined as the thermal diffusivity of the bulk mixture divided by the mass diffusivity of oxygen into the bulk mixture. Understanding the effect of diluent type is desirable because in some undersea and spaceborne habitations, it is desirable to use diluent gases other than nitrogen. Prior experiments have shown that both radiation (Bhattacharjee and Altenkirch, 1993) and Lewis number (Zhang et al, 1992) effects are important in flame spreading problems.

Reducing firing of an early pottery making kiln at Batán Grande, Peru: A Mössbauer study

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wagner, U.; Gebhard, R.; Häusler, W.; Hutzelmann, T.; Riederer, J.; Shimada, I.; Sosa, J.; Wagner, F. E.

1999-11-01

Material from field firing experiments using a 2,700-year old Formative kiln at Batán Grande, Peru, was studied by X-ray diffraction and Mössbauer spectroscopy. The experiments explore the technology involved in producing the gray and black reduced ware for which Cupisnique and other Formative ceramics are justly known. During firing, the iron-bearing compounds in clays undergo characteristic changes which depend on kiln temperature and atmosphere. These changes can be observed in the Mössbauer spectra. By comparing spectra of an appropriate clay fired in field experiments and in the laboratory with the spectra of ancient ceramics, a description of Formative firing techniques in a reducing environment is attempted.

Maintenance costs of serotiny in a variably serotinous pine: The role of water supply.

PubMed

Martín-Sanz, Ruth C; Callejas-Díaz, Marta; Tonnabel, Jeanne; Climent, José M

2017-01-01

Serotiny is an important adaptation for plants in fire-prone environments. However, different mechanisms also induce the opening of serotinous cones in the absence of fire in variably serotinous species. Xeriscence -cone opening driven by dry and hot conditions- is considered to be mediated only by the external environment, but endogenous factors could also play a significant role. Using the variably serotinous Pinus halepensis as our model species, we determined the effects of cone age and scales density in cone opening, and using in-situ and ex-situ manipulative experiments we investigated the role of water availability in the opening of serotinous cones. We hypothesized that loss of connection between the cones and the branch through the peduncles or the absence of water supply could induce a faster cone opening. Results showed that older cones lost more water and opened at lower temperatures, with no influence of scales density. Both field and chamber manipulative experiments (using paired cones of the same whorl) confirmed that water intake through the peduncles affected significantly the pace of cone opening, such that lack of water supply speeded up cone dehiscence. However, this was true for weakly serotinous provenances-more common in this species-, while highly serotinous provenances were indifferent to this effect in the field test. All our results support that cone serotiny in P. halepensis involves the allocation of water to the cones, which is highly consistent with the previously observed environmental effects. Importantly, the existence of maintenance costs of serotinous cones has strong implications on the effects of climate change in the resilience of natural populations, via modifications of the canopy seed banks and recruitment after stand-replacing fires. Moreover, evolutionary models for serotiny in P. halepensis must take into account the significant contribution of maintenance costs to the complex interaction between genotype and the environment.

Sociogenomics of Cooperation and Conflict during Colony Founding in the Fire Ant Solenopsis invicta

PubMed Central

Manfredini, Fabio; Riba-Grognuz, Oksana; Wurm, Yannick; Keller, Laurent; Shoemaker, DeWayne; Grozinger, Christina M.

2013-01-01

One of the fundamental questions in biology is how cooperative and altruistic behaviors evolved. The majority of studies seeking to identify the genes regulating these behaviors have been performed in systems where behavioral and physiological differences are relatively fixed, such as in the honey bee. During colony founding in the monogyne (one queen per colony) social form of the fire ant Solenopsis invicta, newly-mated queens may start new colonies either individually (haplometrosis) or in groups (pleometrosis). However, only one queen (the “winner”) in pleometrotic associations survives and takes the lead of the young colony while the others (the “losers”) are executed. Thus, colony founding in fire ants provides an excellent system in which to examine the genes underpinning cooperative behavior and how the social environment shapes the expression of these genes. We developed a new whole genome microarray platform for S. invicta to characterize the gene expression patterns associated with colony founding behavior. First, we compared haplometrotic queens, pleometrotic winners and pleometrotic losers. Second, we manipulated pleometrotic couples in order to switch or maintain the social ranks of the two cofoundresses. Haplometrotic and pleometrotic queens differed in the expression of genes involved in stress response, aging, immunity, reproduction and lipid biosynthesis. Smaller sets of genes were differentially expressed between winners and losers. In the second experiment, switching social rank had a much greater impact on gene expression patterns than the initial/final rank. Expression differences for several candidate genes involved in key biological processes were confirmed using qRT-PCR. Our findings indicate that, in S. invicta, social environment plays a major role in the determination of the patterns of gene expression, while the queen's physiological state is secondary. These results highlight the powerful influence of social environment on regulation of the genomic state, physiology and ultimately, social behavior of animals. PMID:23950725

Gaseous emissions from Canadian boreal forest fires

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Cofer, Wesley R., III; Levine, Joel S.; Winstead, Edward L.; Stocks, Brian J.

1990-01-01

CO2-normalized emission ratios for carbon monoxide (CO), hydrogen (H2), methane (CH4), total nonmethane hydrocarbons (TNMHC), and nitrous oxide (N2O) were determined from smoke samples collected during low-altitude helicopter flights over two prescribed fires in northern Ontario, Canada. The emission ratios determined from these prescribed boreal forest fires are compared to emission ratios determined over two graminoid (grass) wetlands fires in central Florida and are found to be substantially higher (elevated levels of reduced gas production relative to CO2) during all stages of combustion. These results argue strongly for the need to characterize biomass burning emissions from the major global vegetation/ecosystems in order to couple combustion emissions to their vegetation/ecosystem type.

Development of fire resistant electronic configurations for use in oxygen enriched environments

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Smith, F. J.

1975-01-01

Design concepts for electronic black boxes and modules were tested in oxygen enriched atmospheres, and it was found that various types of sealed configurations would generally eliminate any flammability hazard. The type of configuration and its construction was found to be of more importance in the elimination of flammability hazards in electronic configurations than the types of materials utilized in them. The design concepts developed for fire hazard free electronic configurations for use in manned space programs are applicable for the design of electronic hardware for any use or environment.

The ash in forest fire affected soils control the soil losses. Part 1. The pioneer research

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Cerdà, Artemi; Pereira, Paulo

2013-04-01

After forest fires, the ash and the remaining vegetation cover on the soil surface are the main protection against erosion agents. The control ash exert on runoff generation mechanism was researched during the 90's (Cerdà, 1998a; 1998b). This pioneer research demonstrated that after forest fires there is a short period of time that runoff and surface wash by water is controlled by the high infiltration rates achieved by the soil, which were high due to the effect of ash acting as a mulch. The research of Cerdà (1998a; 1998b) also contributed to demonstrate that runoff was enhanced four month later upon the wash of the ash by the runoff, but also due to the removal of ash due to dissolution and water infiltration. As a consequence of the ephemeral ash cover the runoff and erosion reached the peak after the removal of the ash (usually four month), and for two years the soil erosion reached the peak (Cerdà, 1998a). Research developed during the last decade shown that the ash and the litter cover together contribute to reduce the soil losses after the forest fire (Cerdà and Doerr, 2008). The fate of the ash is related to the climatic conditions of the post-fire season, as intense thunderstorms erode the ash layer and low intensity rainfall contribute to a higher infiltration rate and the recovery of the vegetation. Another, key factor found during the last two decades that determine the fate of the ash and the soil and water losses is the impact of the fauna (Cerdà and Doerr, 2010). During the last decade new techniques were developed to study the impact of ash in the soil system, such as the one to monitor the ash changes by means of high spatial resolution photography (Pérez Cabello et al., 2012), and laboratory approaches that show the impact of ash as a key factor in the soil hydrology throughout the control they exert on the soil water repellency (Bodí et al., 2012). Laboratory approaches also shown that the fire severity is a key factor on the ash chemical composition (Pereira and Úbeda, 2010) and Pereira et al., 2012). Some of the new research challenges related to ash impact in the fire affected soils are related to the ash redistribution after the fire, the impact of ash in soil and water chemistry, the temporal changes of soil erosion, the control ash exert on vegetation recovery and the role to be played by ash in the best management of fire affected land. Those topics needs new ideas and new scientists such as Paulo Pereira show in the Part II of this abstract. Acknowledgements, Lithuanian Research Council. Project LITFIRE, Fire effects on Lithuanian soils and ecosystems (MIP-48/2011) and the research projects GL2008-02879/BTE and LEDDRA 243857. References Bodí, M., Mataix-Solera, J., Doerr, S., and Cerdà, A. 2011b. The wettability of ash from burned vegetation and its relationship to Mediterranean plant species type, burn severity and total organic carbon content. Geoderma, 160, 599-607. Cerdà, A. 1998a. Postfire dynamics of erosional processes under mediterranean climatic conditions. Z. Geomorphol., 42 (3) 373-398. Cerdà, A. 1998b. Changes in overland flow and infiltration after a rangeland fire in a Mediterranean scrubland. Hydrological Processes, 12, 1031-1042. Cerdà, A., and Doerr, S. H.2010. The effect of ant mounds on overland flow and soil erodibility following a wildfire in eastern Spain. Ecohydrology, 3, 392-401. Cerdà, A., and Doerr, S.H. 2008. The effect of ash and needle cover on surface runoff and erosion in the immediate post-fire period. Catena, 74, 256-263. Pereira, P., and Úbeda, X. 2010. Spatial distribution of heavy metals released from ashes after a wildfire, Journal of Environment Engineering and Landscape Management, 18, 13-22. Pereira, P., Ubeda, X., Martin, D.A. 2012. Fire severity effects on ash chemical composition and extractable elements. Geoderma, 191, 105 - 114. Pérez-Cabello, F., Cerdà, A., de la Riva, J., Echeverría, M.T., García-Martín, A., Ibarra, P., Lasanta, T., Montorio, R., Palacios, V. 2012. Micro-scale post-fire surface cover changes monitored using high spatial resolution photography in a semiarid environment: A useful tool in the study of post-fire soil erosion processes. Journal of Arid Environments, 76, 88-96.

Changing Weather Extremes Call for Early Warning of Potential for Catastrophic Fire

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Boer, Matthias M.; Nolan, Rachael H.; Resco De Dios, Víctor; Clarke, Hamish; Price, Owen F.; Bradstock, Ross A.

2017-12-01

Changing frequencies of extreme weather events and shifting fire seasons call for enhanced capability to forecast where and when forested landscapes switch from a nonflammable (i.e., wet fuel) state to the highly flammable (i.e., dry fuel) state required for catastrophic forest fires. Current forest fire danger indices used in Europe, North America, and Australia rate potential fire behavior by combining numerical indices of fuel moisture content, potential rate of fire spread, and fire intensity. These numerical rating systems lack the physical basis required to reliably quantify forest flammability outside the environments of their development or under novel climate conditions. Here, we argue that exceedance of critical forest flammability thresholds is a prerequisite for major forest fires and therefore early warning systems should be based on a reliable prediction of fuel moisture content plus a regionally calibrated model of how forest fire activity responds to variation in fuel moisture content. We demonstrate the potential of this approach through a case study in Portugal. We use a physically based fuel moisture model with historical weather and fire records to identify critical fuel moisture thresholds for forest fire activity and then show that the catastrophic June 2017 forest fires in central Portugal erupted shortly after fuels in the region dried out to historically unprecedented levels.

Faunal responses to fire in chaparral and sage scrub in California, USA

USGS Publications Warehouse

van Mantgem, Elizabeth; Keeley, Jon E.; Witter, Marti

2015-01-01

Impact of fire on California shrublands has been well studied but nearly all of this work has focused on plant communities. Impact on and recovery of the chaparral fauna has received only scattered attention; this paper synthesizes what is known in this regard for the diversity of animal taxa associated with California shrublands and outlines the primary differences between plant and animal responses to fire. We evaluated the primary faunal modes of resisting fire effects in three categories: 1) endogenous survival in a diapause or diapause-like stage, 2) sheltering in place within unburned refugia, or 3) fleeing and recolonizing. Utilizing these patterns in chaparral and sagescrub, as well as some studies on animals in other mediterranean-climate ecosystems, we derived generalizations about how plants and animals differ in their responses to fire impacts and their post fire recovery. One consequence of these differences is that variation in fire behavior has a much greater potential to affect animals than plants. For example, plants recover from fire endogenously from soil-stored seeds and resprouts, so fire size plays a limited role in determining recovery patterns. However, animals that depend on recolonization of burned sites from metapopulations may be greatly affected by fire size. Animal recolonization may also be greatly affected by regional land use patterns that affect colonization corridors, whereas such regional factors play a minimal role in plant community recovery. Fire characteristics such as rate of spread and fire intensity do not appear to play an important role in determining patterns of chaparral and sage scrub plant recovery after fire. However, these fire behavior characteristics may have a profound role in determining survivorship of some animal populations as slow-moving, smoldering combustion may limit survivorship of animals in burrows, whereas fast-moving, high intensity fires may affect survivorship of animals in above ground refugia or those attempting to flee. Thus, fire regime characteristics may have a much greater effect on postfire recovery of animal communities than plant communities in these shrubland ecosystems.

Study to develop improved fire resistant aircraft passenger seat materials

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Duskin, F. E.; Schutter, K. J.; Sieth, H. H.; Trabold, E. L.

1980-01-01

The Phase 3 study of the NASA 'Improved Fire Resistant Aircraft Seat Materials' involved fire tests of improved materials in multilayered combinations representative of cushion configurations. Tests were conducted to determine their thermal, smoke, and fire resistance characteristics. Additionally, a 'Design Guideline' for Fire Resistant Passenger Seats was written outlining general seat design considerations. Finally, a three-abreast 'Tourist Class' passenger seat assembly fabricated from the most advanced fire-resistant materials was delivered.

The Great Basin: Wildland Fire Management in the Year 2000

Treesearch

James B. Webb

1987-01-01

The future of wildland fire management depends on the course chosen by fire managers today. Our responsiveness to issues will determine how much we influence where we go. Economics in concert with a better appreciation of fire's role in ecosystem dynamics will significantly alter fire management as we know it today. Public subsidies of homeowners who refuse to...

The Zoning of Forest Fire Potential of Gulestan Province Forests Using Granular Computing and MODIS Images

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Jalilzadeh Shadlouei, A.; Delavar, M. R.

2013-09-01

There are many vegetation in Iran. This is because of extent of Iran and its width. One of these vegetation is forest vegetation most prevalent in Northern provinces named Guilan, Mazandaran, Gulestan, Ardebil as well as East Azerbaijan. These forests are always threatened by natural forest fires so much so that there have been reports of tens of fires in recent years. Forest fires are one of the major environmental as well as economic, social and security concerns in the world causing much damages. According to climatology, forest fires are one of the important factors in the formation and dispersion of vegetation. Also, regarding the environment, forest fires cause the emission of considerable amounts of greenhouse gases, smoke and dust into the atmosphere which in turn causes the earth temperature to rise up and are unhealthy to humans, animals and vegetation. In agriculture droughts are the usual side effects of these fires. The causes of forest fires could be categorized as either Human or Natural Causes. Naturally, it is impossible to completely contain forest fires; however, areas with high potentials of fire could be designated and analysed to decrease the risk of fires. The zoning of forest fire potential is a multi-criteria problem always accompanied by inherent uncertainty like other multi-criteria problems. So far, various methods and algorithm for zoning hazardous areas via Remote Sensing (RS) and Geospatial Information System (GIS) have been offered. This paper aims at zoning forest fire potential of Gulestan Province of Iran forests utilizing Remote Sensing, Geospatial Information System, meteorological data, MODIS images and granular computing method. Granular computing is part of granular mathematical and one way of solving multi-criteria problems such forest fire potential zoning supervised by one expert or some experts , and it offers rules for classification with the least inconsistencies. On the basis of the experts' opinion, 6 determinative criterias contributing to forest fires have been designated as follows: vegetation (NDVI), slope, aspect, temperature, humidity and proximity to roadways. By applying these variables on several tentatively selected areas and formation information tables and producing granular decision tree and extraction of rules, the zoning rules (for the areas in question) were extracted. According to them the zoning of the entire area has been conducted. The zoned areas have been classified into 5 categories: high hazard, medium hazard (high), medium hazard (low), low hazard (high), low hazard (low). According to the map, the zoning of most of the areas fall into the low hazard (high) class while the least number of areas have been classified as low hazard (low). Comparing the forest fires in these regions in 2010 with the MODIS data base for forest fires, it is concluded that areas with high hazards of forest fire have been classified with a 64 percent precision. In other word 64 percent of pixels that are in high hazard classification are classified according to MODIS data base. Using this method we obtain a good range of Perception. Manager will reduce forest fire concern using precautionary proceeding on hazardous area.

Pseudorange error analysis for precise indoor positioning system

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pola, Marek; Bezoušek, Pavel

2017-05-01

There is a currently developed system of a transmitter indoor localization intended for fire fighters or members of rescue corps. In this system the transmitter of an ultra-wideband orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing signal position is determined by the time difference of arrival method. The position measurement accuracy highly depends on the directpath signal time of arrival estimation accuracy which is degraded by severe multipath in complicated environments such as buildings. The aim of this article is to assess errors in the direct-path signal time of arrival determination caused by multipath signal propagation and noise. Two methods of the direct-path signal time of arrival estimation are compared here: the cross correlation method and the spectral estimation method.

Long-term man-environment interactions in the Bolivian Amazon: 8000 years of vegetation dynamics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Brugger, Sandra O.; Gobet, Erika; van Leeuwen, Jacqueline F. N.; Ledru, Marie-Pierre; Colombaroli, Daniele; van der Knaap, W. O.; Lombardo, Umberto; Escobar-Torrez, Katerine; Finsinger, Walter; Rodrigues, Leonor; Giesche, Alena; Zarate, Modesto; Veit, Heinz; Tinner, Willy

2016-01-01

Only few studies documenting the vegetation history of the Llanos de Moxos, one of the largest seasonally flooded wetland areas in South America, are available and little is known about the environmental impact of pre-Columbian settlements. We use radiocarbon-dated terrestrial plant macrofossils to establish a sound chronology and palynological analyses to reconstruct the vegetation and fire history of the Lago Rogaguado area. The sedimentary pollen and spore record suggests that wetland and wooded savannah (Cerrado) environments occurred around the lake between 8100 and 5800 cal BP. Fire activity was high during this period and was probably connected to the dry Cerrado environments. The pollen evidence suggests early plant cultivation (Zea mays, Annonaceae and Cucurbitaceae) from 6500 cal BP onwards, which is significantly earlier than hitherto assumed for Amazonia. Gallery forests expanded after 5800 cal BP, when fire activity strongly declined. Forest expansion intensified around 2800 cal BP and continued until 2000 cal BP, when forest cover reached its maximum and fire activity its minimum. The late-Holocene forest expansion to the south and the decrease of fire activity may have resulted from a climatic shift to moister conditions (possibly a shorter dry season). New crops (e.g. Avena-type) or adventive plants (e.g. Rumex acetosella-type) document the impact of European economies after ca. 500 cal BP. Land use intensity remained rather stable over the most recent centuries, arguing against a collapse of settlements in response to the arrival of Europeans, as reconstructed from other Amazonian pollen records.

Applications of Living Fire PRA models to Fire Protection Significance Determination Process in Taiwan

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

De-Cheng, Chen; Chung-Kung, Lo; Tsu-Jen, Lin

2004-07-01

The living fire probabilistic risk assessment (PRA) models for all three operating nuclear power plants (NPPs) in Taiwan had been established in December 2000. In that study, a scenario-based PRA approach was adopted to systematically evaluate the fire and smoke hazards and associated risks. Using these fire PRA models developed, a risk-informed application project had also been completed in December 2002 for the evaluation of cable-tray fire-barrier wrapping exemption. This paper presents a new application of the fire PRA models to fire protection issues using the fire protection significance determination process (FP SDP). The fire protection issues studied may involvemore » the selection of appropriate compensatory measures during the period when an automatic fire detection or suppression system in a safety-related fire zone becomes inoperable. The compensatory measure can either be a 24-hour fire watch or an hourly fire patrol. The living fire PRA models were used to estimate the increase in risk associated with the fire protection issue in terms of changes in core damage frequency (CDF) and large early release frequency (LERF). In compliance with SDP at-power and the acceptance guidelines specified in RG 1.174, the fire protection issues in question can be grouped into four categories; red, yellow, white and green, in accordance with the guidelines developed for FD SDP. A 24-hour fire watch is suggested only required for the yellow condition, while an hourly fire patrol may be adopted for the white condition. More limiting requirement is suggested for the red condition, but no special consideration is needed for the green condition. For the calculation of risk measures, risk impacts from any additional fire scenarios that may have been introduced, as well as more severe initiating events and fire damages that may accompany the fire protection issue should be considered carefully. Examples are presented in this paper to illustrate the evaluation process. (authors)« less

Self-motion improves head direction cell tuning

PubMed Central

Shinder, Michael E.

2014-01-01

Head direction (HD) cells respond when an animal faces a particular direction in the environment and form the basis for the animal's perceived directional heading. When an animal moves through its environment, accurate updating of the HD signal is required to reflect the current heading, but the cells still maintain a representation of HD even when the animal is motionless. This finding suggests that the HD system holds its current state in the absence of input, a view that we tested by rotating a head-restrained rat in the presence of a prominent visual landmark and then stopping it suddenly when facing the cell's preferred firing direction (PFD). Firing rates were unchanged for the first 100 ms, but then progressively decreased over the next 4 s and stabilized at ∼42% of their initial values. When the rat was stopped facing away from the PFD, there was no initial effect of braking, but the firing rate then increased steadily over 4 s and plateaued at ∼14% of its peak firing rate, substantially above initial background firing rates. In experiment 2, the rat was serially placed facing one of eight equidistant directions over 360° and held there for 30 s. Compared with the cell's peak firing rate during a passive rotation session, firing rates were reduced (51%) for in-PFD directions and increased (∼300%) from background levels for off-PFD directions, values comparable to those observed in the braking protocol. These differential HD cell responses demonstrate the importance of self-motion to the HD signal integrity. PMID:24671528

Assessment of the Influence of Fractures on the Dynamics of Coal Seam Fires by Numerical Experiments

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wuttke, Manfred W.; Zeng, Qiang

2016-04-01

Uncontrolled burning coal seam fires still constitute major problems for the coal industry by destroying the resource, a serious hazard for the local people by severe environmental pollution, and a tremendous threat to the global environment by the emission of greenhouse gases and aerosols. In particular when the seams are lying shallow the alteration of the immediate surrounding of the coal seam fire feeds back on the dynamics of the fire. Thermal stress induced fracturing produces direct connections of the fire zone with the atmosphere. This influences the supply with oxygen, the venting of the exhaust gases, and the dissipation of heat. The first two processes are expected to enhance the fire propagation whereas the latter effect should slow it down. With our dedicated coal seam fire code ACME ("Amendable Coal-fire Modeling Exercise") we study these coupled effects of fractures in simulations of typical coal seam fire scenarios based on data from Xinjiang, China. Fractures are predefined as 1D/2D objects in a 2D/3D model geometry and are opened depending on the passage of the heat wave produced by the coal seam fire.

Understanding the Spatio-Temporal Pattern of Fire Disturbance in the Eastern Mongolia Using Modis Product

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wurihan; Zhang, H.; Zhang, Z.; Guo, X.; Zhao, J.; Duwala; Shan, Y.; Hongying

2018-04-01

Fire disturbance plays an important role in maintaining ecological balance, biodiversity and self-renewal. In this paper, the spatio-temporal pattern of fire disturbances in eastern Mongolia are studied by using the ArcGIS spatial analysis method, using the MCD45A1 data of MODIS fire products with long time series. It provides scientific basis and reference for the regional ecological environment security construction and international ecological security. Research indicates: (1) The fire disturbance in eastern Mongolia has obvious high and low peak interleaving phenomenon in the year, and the seasonal change is obvious. (2) The distribution pattern of fire disturbance in eastern Mongolia is aggregated, which indicates that the fire disturbance is not random and it is caused by certain influence. (3) Fire disturbance is mainly distributed in the eastern province of Mongolia, the border between China and Mongolia and the northern forest area of Sukhbaatar province. (4) The fire disturbance in the eastern part of the study area is strong and the southwest is weaker. The spreading regularity of fire disturbances in eastern Mongolia is closer to the natural level of ecosystem.

A Summary of the Scientific Literature on the Effects of Fire on the Concentration of Nutrients in Surface Waters

DTIC Science & Technology

2004-01-01

forests, alpine forests, and so forth); (2) had a range of sampling frequency and dura- tion, such as during and immediately following a fire (from the...1) were done in a variety of environments (savannas, grass- lands, temperate forests, alpine forests, and so forth), (2) had a range of sampling...of Nutrients in Surface Waters Gresswell, R.E., 1999, Fire and aquatic ecosystems in forested biomes of North America: Transactions of the American

Passive fire protection--a vital safety role.

PubMed

MacInnes, Callum; Rankin, Richard

2012-06-01

Callum Maclnnes BSc (Hons), AIFireE, an engineer at WSP UK--part of a global design engineering and management consultancy group specialising in property, transport and infrastructure, industry and environment projects--and his colleague, senior engineer, Richard Rankin CEng MEng (Hons) MIFireE, discuss the importance of passive fire protection in healthcare premises at a time when, due particularly to the difficult financial climate, many hospitals are undergoing upgrading and refurbishment, potentially affording an ideal opportunity to ensure that proper fire compartmentation measures are in place.

The Significance of Fire Service Culture as an Impediment to Effective Leadership in the Homeland Security Environment

DTIC Science & Technology

2012-03-01

somehow poignantly related to the topic at hand. Whether through charm, wit, or emotion, Brunacini knew how to get his desired messages across to his...2006, p. 9). 74 With such an overtly confident perspective we may begin to understand how firefighters may get themselves into trouble on the fire...elements epitomized by fire service culture. It then examines how both internal and external sociological factors contribute to the perpetuation of

Mapping fire effects on ash and soil properties. Current knowledge and future perspectives.

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pereira, Paulo; Cerda, Artemi; Strielko, Irina

2014-05-01

Fire has heterogeneous impacts on ash and soil properties, depending on severity, topography of the burned area, type of soil and vegetation affected, and meteorological conditions during and post-fire. The heterogeneous impacts of fire and the complex topography of wildland environments impose the challenge of understand fire effects at diverse scales in space and time. Mapping is fundamental to identify the impacts of fire on ash and soil properties because allow us to recognize the degree of the fire impact, vulnerable areas, soil protection and distribution of ash and soil nutrients, important to landscape recuperation. Several methodologies have been used to map fire impacts on ash soil properties. Burn severity maps are very useful to understand the immediate and long-term impacts of fire on the ecosystems (Wagtendonk et al., 2004; Kokaly et al., 2007). These studies normally are carried out with remote sensing techniques and study large burned areas. On a large scale it is very important to detect the most vulnerable areas (e.g. with risk of runoff increase, flooding, erosion, sedimentation and debris flow) and propose -if necessary- immediate rehabilitation measures. Post-fire rehabilitation measures can be extremely costly. Thus the identification of the most affected areas will reduce the erosion risks and soil degradation (Miller and Yool, 2002; Robichaud et al., 2007; Robichaud, 2009), as the consequent economical, social and ecological impacts. Recently, the United States Department of Agriculture created a field guide to map post-fire burn severity, based on remote sensing and Geographical Information Systems (GIS) technologies. The map produced should reflect the effects of fire on soil properties, and identify areas where fire was more severe (Parsons et al. 2010). Remote sensing studies have made attempts to estimate soil and ash properties after the fire, as hydrophobicity (Lewis et al., 2008), water infiltration (Finnley and Glenn, 2010), forest floor consumption (Lewis et al., 2011), ash cover (Robichaud et al., 2007) and other aspects related with soil as the vegetation factors that affect post-fire erosion risk (Fox et al., 2008). Field studies had also indented to estimate and map the impacts of fire in soil properties. Contrary to remote sensing studies, the mapping of fire effects on ash and soil properties in the field is specially carried out at small scale (e.g. slope or plot). The small scale resolution studies are important because identify small patterns that are normally ignored by remote sensing studies, but fundamental to understand the post-fire evolution of the burned areas. One of the important aspects of the small scale studies of fire effect on ash and soil properties is the great spatial variability, showing that the impact of fire is extremely heterogeneous in space and time (Outeiro et al., 2008; Pereira et al. in press). The small scale mapping of fire effects on soil properties normally is carried out using Geostatistical methods or using deterministic interpolation methods (Robichaud and Miller, 1999; Pereira et al., 2013). Several reports were published on the spatial distribution and mapping of ash and duff thickness (Robichaud and Miller, 1999; Pereira et al., 2013; Pereira et al. in press), fire severity (Pereira et al., 2014), ash chemical characteristics as total nitrogen (Pereira et al., 2010a), and ash extractable elements (Pereira et al., 2010b). Also, previous works mapped fire effects on soil temperature (Gimeno-Garcia et al., 2004), soil hydrophobicity (Woods et al., 2007), total nitrogen (Hirobe et al., 2003), phosphorous (Rodriguez et al., 2009) and major cations (Outeiro et al., 2008). It is important to integrate remote sensing and field based works of fire effects on ash and soil properties in order to have a better validation of the models predicted. The aim of this work is present the current knowledge about mapping fire effects in ash and soil properties at diverse scales and the future perspectives. References Finley, C.D., Glenn, N.F. (2010) Fire and vegetation type effects on soil hydrophobicity and infiltration in the sagebrussh-steppe: II. Hyperspectral analysis. Journal of Arid Environments, 74: 660-666. Fox, D.A., Maselli, F., Carrega, P. (2008) Using SPOT images and field sampling to map burn severity and vegetation factors affecting post-fire erosion risk. Catena, 75: 326-335. Gimeno-Garcia. E., Andreu., V., Rubio, J.L. (2004) Spatial patterns of soil temperatures during experiemntal fires. Geoderma, 118: 17-34. Hirobe, M., Tokushi, N., Wachrinrat, C., Takeda, H. (2003) Fire history influences on the spatial heterogeneity of soil nitrogen transformations in three adjacent stands in a dry tropical forest in Thailand. Plant and Soil, 249: 309-318. Kokaly, R.F., Rockwell, B.W., Haire, S.L., King, T.V.V. (2007) Characterization of post fire surface cover, soils, and burn severity at the Cerro Grande fire, New Mexico, using hyperspectral and multispectral remote sensing. Remote Sensing of the Environment, 106: 305-325. Lewis, S.A., Hudak, A.T., Ottmar, R.D., Robichaud, P.R., Lentile, L.B., Hood, S.M., Cronan, J.B., Morgan, P. (2012) Using hyperspectral imagery to estimate forest floor consumption from wildfire in boreal forests of Alaska. International Journal of Wildland Fire, 20: 255-271. Lewis, S.A., Robichaud, P.R., Frazier, B.E., Wu, J.Q., Laes, D.Y.M. (2008) Using hyperspectral imagery to predict post-wildfire soil repellency. Geomorphology, 98, 192-205. Miller, J.D., Yool, S. (2002) Mapping forest post-fire canopy consumption in several overstory types using multi-temporal Landsat TM and ETM data. Remote Sensing of the Environment, 82: 481-496. Outeiro, L., Aspero, F., Ubeda, X. (2008) Geostatistical methods to study spatial variability of soil cation after a prescribed fire and rainfall. Catena, 74: 310-320. Parsons, A., Robichaud, P.R., Lewis, S.A., Napper, C., Clark, J.T. (2010) Field guide for mapping post-fire soil burn severity. Gen. Tech. Rep. RMRS-GTR-243. Fort Collins, CO: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station. 49 p. Pereira, P. Úbeda X., Martin D A (2010b) Mapping wildfire effects on Ca2+ and Mg2+ released from ash. A microplot analysis, EGU General Assembly 2010, Geophysical Research Abstracts, 12,EGU 2010 - 30 Vienna. ISSN: 1607-7962. Pereira, P., Cerdà, A., Úbeda, X., Mataix-Solera, J. Arcenegui, V., Zavala, L. Modelling the impacts of wildfire on ash thickness in a short-term period, Land Degradation and Development, (In Press), DOI: 10.1002/ldr.2195 Pereira, P., Cerdà, A., Úbeda, X., Mataix-Solera, J., Jordan, A. Burguet, M. (2013) Spatial models for monitoring the spatio-temporal evolution of ashes after fire - a case study of a burnt grassland in Lithuania, Solid Earth, 4: 153-165. Pereira, P., Úbeda, X., Baltrenaite, E. (2010a) Mapping Total Nitrogen in ash after a Wildfire, a microplot analysis, Ekologija, 56 (3-4), 144-152. Pereira, P., Cerda, A., Ubeda, X., Mataix-Solera, J., Martin, D.A., Jordan, A., Martin, D.A., Mierauskas, P., Arcenegui, V., Zavala, L. (2014) Do fire severity effects change with the time?, What ash tell us, Flamma, 5: 23-27. Robichaud, P.R. (2009) Post-fire stabilization and rehabilitation. In: Cerda, A., Robichaud, P. (eds) Fire Effects on Soils and Restoration Strategies, Science Publishers, 299-320. Robichaud, P.R., Lewis, S.A., Laes, D.Y.M., Hudak, A.T., Kokaly, R.F., Zamudio, J.Z. (2007) Post-fire burn severity mapping with hyperspectral image unmixing. Remote Sensing of the Environment, 108: 467-480. Robichaud, P.R., Miller, S.M. (1999) Spatial interpolation and simulation of post-burn duff thickness after prescribed fire. International Journal of Wildland Fire, 9: 137-143. Rodriguez, A., Duran, J., Fernandez-Palacios, J.M., Gallardo, A. (2009) Short-term wildfire effects on the spatial pattern and scale of labile organic-N and inorganic-N and P pools. Forest Ecology and Management, 257: 739-746. Wagtendonk, J.W., Root, R.R., Key, C.H. (2004) Comparison of AVIRIS and Landsat ETM+ detection capabilities for burn severity. Remote Sensing of the Environment, 92: 397-408. Woods, S.W., Birkas, A., Ahl, R. (2007) Spatial variability of soil hydrophobicity after wildfires in Montana and Colorado. Geomorphology, 86: 465-479.

Importance of fuel treatment for limiting moderate-to-high intensity fire: Findings from comparative fire modeling

Treesearch

Geoffrey J. Cary; Ian D. Davies; Ross A. Bradstock; Robert E. Keane; Mike D. Flannigan

2017-01-01

Context: Wildland fire intensity influences natural communities, soil properties, erosion, and sequestered carbon. Measuring effectiveness of fuel treatment for reducing area of higher intensity unplanned fire is argued to be more meaningful than determining effect on total unplanned area burned. Objectives...

Predicting fire-based perennial bunchgrass mortality in low elevation big sagebrush plant communities

USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

Maintenance and post-fire rehabilitation of perennial bunchgrasses is important for reducing the spread of annual grass species in low elevation big sagebrush plant communities. Post-fire rehabilitation decisions are hampered by a lack of tools for determining extent of fire-induced perennial grass...

Induction of antimicrobial 3-deoxyflavonoids in pome fruit trees controls fire blight.

PubMed

Halbwirth, Heidrun; Fischer, Thilo C; Roemmelt, Susanne; Spinelli, Francesco; Schlangen, Karin; Peterek, Silke; Sabatini, Emidio; Messina, Christian; Speakman, John-Bryan; Andreotti, Carlo; Rademacher, Wilhelm; Bazzi, Carlo; Costa, Guglielmo; Treutter, Dieter; Forkmann, Gert; Stich, Karl

2003-01-01

Fire blight, a devastating bacterial disease in pome fruits, causes severe economic losses worldwide. Hitherto, an effective control could only be achieved by using antibiotics, but this implies potential risks for human health, livestock and environment. A new approach allows transient inhibition of a step in the flavonoid pathway, thereby inducing the formation of a novel antimicrobial 3-deoxyflavonoid controlling fire blight in apple and pear leaves. This compound is closely related to natural phytoalexins in sorghum. The approach does not only provide a safe method to control fire blight: Resistance against different pathogens is also induced in other crop plants.

Fire structures pine serotiny at different scales.

PubMed

Hernández-Serrano, Ana; Verdú, Miguel; González-Martínez, Santiago C; Pausas, Juli G

2013-12-01

Serotiny (delayed seed release with the consequent accumulation of a canopy seedbank) confers fitness benefits in environments with crown-fire regimes. Thus, we predicted that serotiny level should be higher in populations recurrently subjected to crown-fires than in populations where crown-fires are rare. In addition, under a high frequency of fires, space and resources are recurrently available, permitting recruitment around each mother to follow the seed rain shadow. Thus, we also predicted spatial aggregation of serotiny within populations. We compared serotiny, considering both the proportion and the age of serotinous cones, in populations living in contrasting fire regimes for two iconic Mediterranean pine species (Pinus halepensis, P. pinaster). We framed our results by quantitatively comparing the strength of the fire-serotiny relationship with previous studies worldwide. For the two species, populations living under high crown-fire recurrence regimes had a higher serotiny level than those populations where the recurrence of crown-fires was low. For P. halepensis (the species with higher serotiny), populations in high fire recurrence regimes had higher fine-scale spatial aggregation of serotiny than those inhabiting low fire recurrence systems. The strength of the observed fire-serotiny relationship in P. halepensis is among the highest in published literature. Fire regime shapes serotiny level among populations, and in populations with high serotiny, recurrent fires maintain a significant spatial structure for this trait. Consequently, fire has long-term evolutionary implications at different scales, emphasizing its prominent role in shaping the ecology of pines.

Forest fire risk zonation mapping using remote sensing technology

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chandra, Sunil; Arora, M. K.

2006-12-01

Forest fires cause major losses to forest cover and disturb the ecological balance in our region. Rise in temperature during summer season causing increased dryness, increased activity of human beings in the forest areas, and the type of forest cover in the Garhwal Himalayas are some of the reasons that lead to forest fires. Therefore, generation of forest fire risk maps becomes necessary so that preventive measures can be taken at appropriate time. These risk maps shall indicate the zonation of the areas which are in very high, high, medium and low risk zones with regard to forest fire in the region. In this paper, an attempt has been made to generate the forest fire risk maps based on remote sensing data and other geographical variables responsible for the occurrence of fire. These include altitude, temperature and soil variations. Key thematic data layers pertaining to these variables have been generated using various techniques. A rule-based approach has been used and implemented in GIS environment to estimate fuel load and fuel index leading to the derivation of fire risk zonation index and subsequently to fire risk zonation maps. The fire risk maps thus generated have been validated on the ground for forest types as well as for forest fire risk areas. These maps would help the state forest departments in prioritizing their strategy for combating forest fires particularly during the fire seasons.

Tree mortality based fire severity classification for forest inventories: A Pacific Northwest national forests example

Treesearch

Thomas R. Whittier; Andrew N. Gray

2016-01-01

Determining how the frequency, severity, and extent of forest fires are changing in response to changes in management and climate is a key concern in many regions where fire is an important natural disturbance. In the USA the only national-scale fire severity classification uses satellite image changedetection to produce maps for large (>400 ha) fires, and is...

Using GRACE-Derived Water and Moisture Products as a Predictive Tool for Fire Response in the Contiguous United States

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rousseau, N. J.; Jensen, D.; Zajic, B.; Rodell, M.; Reager, J. T., II

2015-12-01

Understanding the relationship between wildfire activity and soil moisture in the United States has been difficult to assess, with limited ability to determine areas that are at high risk. This limitation is largely due to complex environmental factors at play, especially as they relate to alternating periods of wet and dry conditions, and the lack of remotely-sensed products. Recent drought conditions and accompanying low Fuel Moisture Content (FMC) have led to disastrous wildfire outbreaks causing economic loss, property damage, and environmental degradation. Thus, developing a programmed toolset to assess the relationship between soil moisture, which contributes greatly to FMC and fire severity, can establish the framework for determining overall wildfire risk. To properly evaluate these parameters, we used data assimilated from the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) and data from the Fire Program Analysis fire-occurrence database (FPA FOD) to determine the extent soil moisture affects fire activity. Through these datasets, we produced correlation and regression maps at a coarse resolution of 0.25 degrees for the contiguous United States. These fire-risk products and toolsets proved the viability of this methodology, allowing for the future incorporation of more GRACE-derived water parameters, MODIS vegetation indices, and other environmental datasets to refine the model for fire risk. Additionally, they will allow assessment to national-scale early fire management and provide responders with a predictive tool to better employ early decision-support to areas of high risk during regions' respective fire season(s).

Joint Use of Sentinel-1 and Landsat-8 data for Burned Areas Mapping: the Case of the Sardinia Island, Italy

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pepe, Antonio; Azar, Ramin; Calò, Fabiana; Stroppiana, Daniela; Brivio, Pietro Alessandro; Imperatore, Pasquale

2016-04-01

Fires widely affect Mediterranean regions, causing severe threats to human lives and damages to natural environments. The socio-economic impacts of fires on the affected local communities are significant, indeed, the activation of prevention measures and the extinguishment of fires and reclamation of the pre-fire conditions are very expensive. Moreover, fires have also global impacts: they affect global warming and climate changes due to gas and aerosol emissions to atmosphere. In such a context, fire scars mapping and monitoring are fundamental tasks for a sustainable management of natural resources and for the prevention/mitigation of fire risk. With this respect, remotely sensed data offer the opportunity for a regional-up-to-global scale monitoring of areas prone to fires, on a cost-effective and regular basis. In this work, the potential of a joint use of Sentinel-1A (C-band) Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) and Landsat-8 Operational Land Imager (OLI) data for detecting burned areas is investigated. The experimental analyses are conducted by focusing on Sardinia Island, which is one of the Italian regions most affected by fire events during summer. Our analysis shows that the capability of monitoring burned areas in the Mediterranean environment can be improved by exploiting information embedded in OLI multispectral bands in conjunction with multi-temporal dual-polarized SAR data. Indeed, limitations experienced in analyses based on the use of only optical data (e.g., cloud cover, spectral overlap/confusion of burned areas with dark soils, water surfaces and shaded regions) may be overcome by using SAR data, owing to the insensitiveness to sunlight-illumination conditions and the cloud-penetrating capability of microwave radiation. Results prove the effectiveness of an integrated approach based on the combination of optical and microwave imagery for the monitoring and mapping of burned areas in vegetated regions.

Room temperature degradation of YBa2Cu3O(7-x) superconductors in varying relative humidity environments

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hooker, M. W.; Wise, S. A.; Carlberg, I. A.; Stephens, R. M.; Simchick, R. T.; Farjami, A.

1993-01-01

An aging study was performed to determine the stability of YBa2Cu3O(7-x) ceramics in humid environments at 20 C. In this study, fired ceramic specimens were exposed to humidity levels ranging from 30.5 to 100 percent for 2-, 4-, and 6-week time intervals. After storage under these conditions, the specimens were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and electrical resistance measurements. At every storage condition evaluated, the fired ceramics were found to interact with H2O present in the surrounding environment, resulting in the decomposition of the YBa2Cu3O(7-x) phase. XRD data showed that BaCO3, CuO, and Y2BaCuO5 were present after aging and that the peak intensities of these impurity phases increased both with increasing humidity level and with increasing time of exposure. Additionally, SEM analyses of the ceramic microstructures after aging revealed the development of needle-like crystallites along the surface of the test specimens after aging. Furthermore, the superconducting transition temperature T(sub c) was found to decrease both with increasing humidity level and with increasing time of exposure. All the specimens aged at 30.5, 66, and 81 percent relative humidity exhibited superconducting transitions above 80 K, although these values were reduced by the exposure to the test conditions. Conversely, the specimens stored in direct contact with water (100 percent relative humidity) exhibited no superconducting transitions.

Large eddy simulation of fire-induced buoyancy driven plume dispersion in an urban street canyon under perpendicular wind flow.

PubMed

Hu, L H; Huo, R; Yang, D

2009-07-15

The dispersion of fire-induced buoyancy driven plume in and above an idealized street canyon of 18 m (width) x 18 m (height) x 40 m (length) with a wind flow perpendicular to its axis was investigated by Fire Dynamics Simulator (FDS), Large Eddy Simulation (LES). Former studies, such as that by Oka [T.R. Oke, Street design and urban canopy layer climate, Energy Build. 11 (1988) 103-113], Gayev and Savory [Y.A. Gayev, E. Savory, Influence of street obstructions on flow processes within street canyons. J. Wind Eng. Ind. Aerodyn. 82 (1999) 89-103], Xie et al. [S. Xie, Y. Zhang, L. Qi, X. Tang, Spatial distribution of traffic-related pollutant concentrations in street canyons. Atmos. Environ. 37 (2003) 3213-3224], Baker et al. [J. Baker, H. L. Walker, X. M. Cai, A study of the dispersion and transport of reactive pollutants in and above street canyons--a large eddy simulation, Atmos. Environ. 38 (2004) 6883-6892] and Baik et al. [J.-J. Baik, Y.-S. Kang, J.-J. Kim, Modeling reactive pollutant dispersion in an urban street canyon, Atmos. Environ. 41 (2007) 934-949], focus on the flow pattern and pollutant dispersion in the street canyon with no buoyancy effect. Results showed that with the increase of the wind flow velocity, the dispersion pattern of a buoyant plume fell into four regimes. When the wind flow velocity increased up to a certain critical level, the buoyancy driven upward rising plume was re-entrained back into the street canyon. This is a dangerous situation as the harmful fire smoke will accumulate to pollute the environment and thus threaten the safety of the people in the street canyon. This critical re-entrainment wind velocity, as an important parameter to be concerned, was further revealed to increase asymptotically with the heat/buoyancy release rate of the fire.

Influence of savanna fire on Australian monsoon season precipitation and circulation as simulated using a distributed computing environment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lynch, Amanda H.; Abramson, David; Görgen, Klaus; Beringer, Jason; Uotila, Petteri

2007-10-01

Fires in the Australian savanna have been hypothesized to affect monsoon evolution, but the hypothesis is controversial and the effects have not been quantified. A distributed computing approach allows the development of a challenging experimental design that permits simultaneous variation of all fire attributes. The climate model simulations are distributed around multiple independent computer clusters in six countries, an approach that has potential for a range of other large simulation applications in the earth sciences. The experiment clarifies that savanna burning can shape the monsoon through two mechanisms. Boundary-layer circulation and large-scale convergence is intensified monotonically through increasing fire intensity and area burned. However, thresholds of fire timing and area are evident in the consequent influence on monsoon rainfall. In the optimal band of late, high intensity fires with a somewhat limited extent, it is possible for the wet season to be significantly enhanced.

An emergency-adaptive routing scheme for wireless sensor networks for building fire hazard monitoring.

PubMed

Zeng, Yuanyuan; Sreenan, Cormac J; Sitanayah, Lanny; Xiong, Naixue; Park, Jong Hyuk; Zheng, Guilin

2011-01-01

Fire hazard monitoring and evacuation for building environments is a novel application area for the deployment of wireless sensor networks. In this context, adaptive routing is essential in order to ensure safe and timely data delivery in building evacuation and fire fighting resource applications. Existing routing mechanisms for wireless sensor networks are not well suited for building fires, especially as they do not consider critical and dynamic network scenarios. In this paper, an emergency-adaptive, real-time and robust routing protocol is presented for emergency situations such as building fire hazard applications. The protocol adapts to handle dynamic emergency scenarios and works well with the routing hole problem. Theoretical analysis and simulation results indicate that our protocol provides a real-time routing mechanism that is well suited for dynamic emergency scenarios in building fires when compared with other related work.

An Emergency-Adaptive Routing Scheme for Wireless Sensor Networks for Building Fire Hazard Monitoring

PubMed Central

Zeng, Yuanyuan; Sreenan, Cormac J.; Sitanayah, Lanny; Xiong, Naixue; Park, Jong Hyuk; Zheng, Guilin

2011-01-01

Fire hazard monitoring and evacuation for building environments is a novel application area for the deployment of wireless sensor networks. In this context, adaptive routing is essential in order to ensure safe and timely data delivery in building evacuation and fire fighting resource applications. Existing routing mechanisms for wireless sensor networks are not well suited for building fires, especially as they do not consider critical and dynamic network scenarios. In this paper, an emergency-adaptive, real-time and robust routing protocol is presented for emergency situations such as building fire hazard applications. The protocol adapts to handle dynamic emergency scenarios and works well with the routing hole problem. Theoretical analysis and simulation results indicate that our protocol provides a real-time routing mechanism that is well suited for dynamic emergency scenarios in building fires when compared with other related work. PMID:22163774

Local Planning Considerations for the Wildland-Structural Intermix in the Year 2000

Treesearch

Robert L. Irwin

1987-01-01

California's foothill counties are the scene of rapid development. All types of construction in former wildlands is creating an intermix of wildland-structures-wildland that is different from the traditional "urban-wildland interface." The fire and structural environment for seven counties is described. Fire statistics are compared with growth patterns...

42 CFR 482.41 - Condition of participation: Physical environment.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-10-01

...: Life safety from fire. (1) Except as otherwise provided in this section— (i) The hospital must meet the applicable provisions of the 2000 edition of the Life Safety Code of the National Fire Protection Association... Life Safety Code, issued January 14, 2000, for incorporation by reference in accordance with 5 U.S.C...

42 CFR 482.41 - Condition of participation: Physical environment.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-10-01

...: Life safety from fire. (1) Except as otherwise provided in this section— (i) The hospital must meet the applicable provisions of the 2000 edition of the Life Safety Code of the National Fire Protection Association... Life Safety Code, issued January 14, 2000, for incorporation by reference in accordance with 5 U.S.C...

Green leaf volatiles, fire and nonanoic acid activate MAPkinases in the model grass species Lolium temulentum

USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

Forage and turf related grasses are utilized in diverse environments where they are routinely subjected to herbicides and exposed to fire and volatiles after cutting, however very little is known concerning the perception or molecular responses to these different stresses or compounds. In the model ...

Oxygen Assessments Ensure Safer Medical Devices

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

2013-01-01

A team at White Sands Test Facility developed a test method to evaluate fire hazards in oxygen-enriched environments. Wendell Hull and Associates, located in Las Cruces, New Mexico, entered a Space Act Agreement with NASA and now provides services including fire and explosion investigations, oxygen testing and training, and accident reconstruction and forensic engineering.

76 FR 17327 - 100th Anniversary of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2011-03-29

... responsibility to provide a safe environment for all American workers. NOW, THEREFORE, I, BARACK OBAMA, President... since the Triangle factory fire, we are still fighting to provide adequate working conditions for all... collective bargaining as a tool to give workers a seat at the tables of power. Working Americans are the...

Contribution of Earth Observation and meteorological datasets for the design and development of a national fire risk assessment system (NFOFRAS)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Katagis, Thomas; Bliziotis, Dimitris; Liantinioti, Chrysa; Gitas, Ioannis Z.; Charalampopoulou, Betty

2016-08-01

During the past decades, forest fires have increased both in frequency and severity thus, increasing the life threats for people and environment and leading countries to spend vast amounts of resources in fighting forest fires. Besides anthropogenic activities, climatic and environmental changes are considered as driving factors affecting fire occurrence and vegetation succession. Especially in the Mediterranean region, the development and existence of effective tools and services is crucial for assisting pre-fire planning and preparedness. The collaborative project NFOFRAS aims at introducing an innovative and effective system for rating forest fire risk, and is based on existing technology and standards that have been developed by countries with a long and a very successful involvement in this field. During the first phase of the project a detailed documentation of the proposed methodology was composed. In addition, Earth Observation (EO) and meteorological datasets were utilized for producing accurate pre-fire measurements over a selected study area in Greece.

Spatio-Temporal Analysis of Forest Fire Risk and Danger Using LANDSAT Imagery.

PubMed

Saglam, Bülent; Bilgili, Ertugrul; Dincdurmaz, Bahar; Kadiogulari, Ali Ihsan; Kücük, Ömer

2008-06-20

Computing fire danger and fire risk on a spatio-temporal scale is of crucial importance in fire management planning, and in the simulation of fire growth and development across a landscape. However, due to the complex nature of forests, fire risk and danger potential maps are considered one of the most difficult thematic layers to build up. Remote sensing and digital terrain data have been introduced for efficient discrete classification of fire risk and fire danger potential. In this study, two time-series data of Landsat imagery were used for determining spatio-temporal change of fire risk and danger potential in Korudag forest planning unit in northwestern Turkey. The method comprised the following two steps: (1) creation of indices of the factors influencing fire risk and danger; (2) evaluation of spatio-temporal changes in fire risk and danger of given areas using remote sensing as a quick and inexpensive means and determining the pace of forest cover change. Fire risk and danger potential indices were based on species composition, stand crown closure, stand development stage, insolation, slope and, proximity of agricultural lands to forest and distance from settlement areas. Using the indices generated, fire risk and danger maps were produced for the years 1987 and 2000. Spatio-temporal analyses were then realized based on the maps produced. Results obtained from the study showed that the use of Landsat imagery provided a valuable characterization and mapping of vegetation structure and type with overall classification accuracy higher than 83%.

Estimation of postfire nutrient loss in the Florida everglades.

PubMed

Qian, Y; Miao, S L; Gu, B; Li, Y C

2009-01-01

Postfire nutrient release into ecosystem via plant ash is critical to the understanding of fire impacts on the environment. Factors determining a postfire nutrient budget are prefire nutrient content in the combustible biomass, burn temperature, and the amount of combustible biomass. Our objective was to quantitatively describe the relationships between nutrient losses (or concentrations in ash) and burning temperature in laboratory controlled combustion and to further predict nutrient losses in field fire by applying predictive models established based on laboratory data. The percentage losses of total nitrogen (TN), total carbon (TC), and material mass showed a significant linear correlation with a slope close to 1, indicating that TN or TC loss occurred predominantly through volatilization during combustion. Data obtained in laboratory experiments suggest that the losses of TN, TC, as well as the ratio of ash total phosphorus (TP) concentration to leaf TP concentration have strong relationships with burning temperature and these relationships can be quantitatively described by nonlinear equations. The potential use of these nonlinear models relating nutrient loss (or concentration) to temperature in predicting nutrient concentrations in field ash appear to be promising. During a prescribed fire in the northern Everglades, 73.1% of TP was estimated to be retained in ash while 26.9% was lost to the atmosphere, agreeing well with the distribution of TP during previously reported wild fires. The use of predictive models would greatly reduce the cost associated with measuring field ash nutrient concentrations.

Memory retrieval along the proximodistal axis of CA1.

PubMed

Nakazawa, Yuki; Pevzner, Aleksandr; Tanaka, Kazumasa Z; Wiltgen, Brian J

2016-09-01

The proximal and distal segments of CA1 are thought to perform distinct computations. Neurons in proximal CA1 are reciprocally connected with the medial entorhinal cortex (MEC) and exhibit precise spatial firing. In contrast, cells in distal CA1 communicate with the lateral entorhinal cortex (LEC), exhibit more diffuse spatial firing and are affected by the presence of objects in the environment. To determine if these segments make unique contributions to memory retrieval, we examined cellular activity along the proximodistal axis of CA1 using transgenic reporter mice. Neurons tagged during context learning in proximal CA1 were more likely to be reactivated during testing than those in distal CA1. This was true following context fear conditioning and after exposure to a novel environment. Reactivation was also higher in brain regions connected to proximal CA1 (MEC, distal CA3) than those connected to the distal segment (LEC, proximal CA3). To examine contributions to memory retrieval, we performed neurotoxic lesions of proximal or distal CA1 after training. Lesions of the proximal segment significantly impaired memory retrieval while damage to distal CA1 had no effect. These data suggest that context memories are retrieved by a hippocampal microcircuit that involves the proximal but not distal segment of CA1. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Hazard Identification and Risk Assessment in Water Treatment Plant considering Environmental Health and Safety Practice

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Falakh, Fajrul; Setiani, Onny

2018-02-01

Water Treatment Plant (WTP) is an important infrastructure to ensure human health and the environment. In its development, aspects of environmental safety and health are of concern. This paper case study was conducted at the Water Treatment Plant Company in Semarang, Central Java, Indonesia. Hazard identification and risk assessment is one part of the occupational safety and health program at the risk management stage. The purpose of this study was to identify potential hazards using hazard identification methods and risk assessment methods. Risk assessment is done using criteria of severity and probability of accident. The results obtained from this risk assessment are 22 potential hazards present in the water purification process. Extreme categories that exist in the risk assessment are leakage of chlorine and industrial fires. Chlorine and fire leakage gets the highest value because its impact threatens many things, such as industrial disasters that could endanger human life and the environment. Control measures undertaken to avoid potential hazards are to apply the use of personal protective equipment, but management will also be better managed in accordance with hazard control hazards, occupational safety and health programs such as issuing work permits, emergency response training is required, Very useful in overcoming potential hazards that have been determined.

Birth wind and fire: raising awareness to operating room fires during delivery.

PubMed

Wolf, Omer; Weissman, Oren; Harats, Moti; Farber, Nimrod; Stavrou, Demetris; Tessone, Ariel; Zilinsky, Isaac; Winkler, Eyal; Haik, Josef

2013-09-01

We researched whether the obstetric operating room (OR) qualified as a fire-risk environment so as to take preventive measures accordingly. We analyzed a series of iatrogenic burns inflicted during birth by collecting clinical data and comparing it with known OR fire risk factors and with other factors that repeated in all cases in search of unique characteristics of the obstetric OR. All three cases shared in common the same type of oxygen-rich open ventilation system, alcohol-based prepping solution, and the hastiness of cesarean delivery while spontaneous vaginal delivery was already in progress. The obstetric OR is, as suspected, a fire-prone zone in more ways than the regular OR. Therefore, preventive measures should be undertaken and awareness for the possibility for such occurrences should be raised.

CID-720 aircraft Langley Research Center preflight hardware tests: Development, flight acceptance and qualification

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Pride, J. D.

1986-01-01

The testing conducted on LaRC-developed hardware for the controlled impact demonstration transport aircraft is discussed. To properly develop flight qualified crash systems, two environments were considered: the aircraft flight environment with the focus on vibration and temperature effects, and the crash environment with the long pulse shock effects. Also with the large quantity of fuel in the wing tanks the possibility of fire was considered to be a threat to data retrieval and thus fire tests were included in the development test process. The aircraft test successfully demonstrated the performance of the LaRC developed heat shields. Good telemetered data (S-band) was received during the impact and slide-out phase, and even after the aircraft came to rest. The two onboard DAS tape recorders were protected from the intense fire and high quality tape data was recovered. The complete photographic system performed as planned throughout the 40.0 sec of film supply. The four photo power distribution pallets remained in good condition and all ten onboard 16 mm high speed (400 frames/sec) cameras produced good film data.

Strategy for increasing the participation of masyarakat peduli api in forest fire control

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ni’mah, N. L. K.; Herdiansyah, H.; Soesilo, T. E. B.; Mutia, E. F.

2018-03-01

Forest fires have negative impact on ecology, health, and damage economic activities. One of conservation areas facing the threat of forest fire is Gunung Ciremai National Park. This research aims to formulate a strategy to increase the participation of Masyarakat Peduli Api in the effort of forest fire control. This research use quantitative method with SWOT analysis. Expert consisting of representatives from the national park, Ministry of Environment and Forestry, and BPBD Kuningan Regency. An alternative strategy based on SWOT analysis is in quadrant 1 with coordinate point (0,39; 1,23). The position shows that sustainability of national park management through forest fire control can be done with an aggressive strategy. That is maximizing the strength that is owned with its potential as an ecotourism area to increase community motivation to engage in forest fire control activities. Provision of tourism management licenses will create employment opportunities and increase income for the community so it is expected to increase community participation to prevent the occurrence of forest fires rather than forest fire prevention.

Mechanised spraying device a novel technology for spraying fire protective coating material in the benches of opencast coal mines for preventing spontaneous combustion

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

R.V.K. Singh; V.K. Singh

2004-10-15

Spontaneous combustion in coal mines plays a vital role in occurrences of fire. Fire in coal, particularly in opencast mines, not only causes irreparable loss of national wealth but damages the surface structure and pollutes the environment. The problem of spontaneous combustion/fire in opencast coal benches is acute. Presently over 75% of the total production of coal in Indian mines is being carried out by opencast mining. Accordingly a mechanised spraying device has been developed for spraying the fire protective coating material for preventing spontaneous combustion in coal benches of opencast mines jointly by Central Mining Research Institute, Dhanbad andmore » M/s Signum Fire Protection (India) Pvt. Ltd., Nagpur under Science & Technology (S&T) project funded by Ministry of Coal, Govt. of India. The objective of this paper is to describe in detail about the mechanised spraying device and its application for spraying fire protective coating material in the benches of opencast coal mines for preventing spontaneous combustion/fire.« less

Retrospective fire modeling: Quantifying the impacts of fire suppression

Treesearch

Brett H. Davis; Carol Miller; Sean A. Parks

2010-01-01

Land management agencies need to understand and monitor the consequences of their fire suppression decisions. We developed a framework for retrospective fire behavior modeling and impact assessment to determine where ignitions would have spread had they not been suppressed and to assess the cumulative effects that would have resulted. This document is a general...

Measurements of forest fire danger

Treesearch

Leo Shames

1938-01-01

Although the annual destruction of life and property attributable to forest fires is enormous, scientific methods of forest fire control in the United States are of comparatively recent origin. In one important phase of control, that of determining how large a network of observers is necessary for the purpose of discovering forest fires in their infancy, accurate means...

Fire regimes and approaches for determining fire history

Treesearch

James K. Agee

1996-01-01

Fire has been an important evolutionary influence in forests, affecting species composition, structure, and functional aspects of forest biology. Restoration of wildland forests of the future will depend in part on restoring fire to an appropriate role in forest ecosystems. This may include the "range of natural variability" or other concepts associated with...

Biomass consumption during prescribed fires in big sagebrush ecosystems

Treesearch

Clinton S. Wright; Susan J. Prichard

2006-01-01

Big sagebrush (Artemisia tridentata) ecosystems typically experience stand replacing fires during which some or all of the ignited biomass is consumed. Biomass consumption is directly related to the energy released during a fire, and is an important factor that determines smoke production and the effects of fire on other resources. Consumption of...

Determining the optimal mix of federal and contract fire crews: a case study from the Pacific Northwest.

Treesearch

Geoffrey H. Donovan

2006-01-01

Federal land management agencies in the United States are increasingly relying on contract crews as opposed to agency fire crews. Despite this increasing reliance on contractors, there have been no studies to determine what the optimal mix of contract and agency fire crews should be. A mathematical model is presented to address this question and is applied to a case...

Effects of fire on major forest ecosystem processes: an overview.

PubMed

Chen, Zhong

2006-09-01

Fire and fire ecology are among the best-studied topics in contemporary ecosystem ecology. The large body of existing literature on fire and fire ecology indicates an urgent need to synthesize the information on the pattern of fire effects on ecosystem composition, structure, and functions for application in fire and ecosystem management. Understanding fire effects and underlying principles are critical to reduce the risk of uncharacteristic wildfires and for proper use of fire as an effective management tool toward management goals. This overview is a synthesis of current knowledge on major effects of fire on fire-prone ecosystems, particularly those in the boreal and temperate regions of the North America. Four closely related ecosystem processes in vegetation dynamics, nutrient cycling, soil and belowground process and water relations were discussed with emphases on fire as the driving force. Clearly, fire can shape ecosystem composition, structure and functions by selecting fire adapted species and removing other susceptible species, releasing nutrients from the biomass and improving nutrient cycling, affecting soil properties through changing soil microbial activities and water relations, and creating heterogeneous mosaics, which in turn, can further influence fire behavior and ecological processes. Fire as a destructive force can rapidly consume large amount of biomass and cause negative impacts such as post-fire soil erosion and water runoff, and air pollution; however, as a constructive force fire is also responsible for maintaining the health and perpetuity of certain fire-dependent ecosystems. Considering the unique ecological roles of fire in mediating and regulating ecosystems, fire should be incorporated as an integral component of ecosystems and management. However, the effects of fire on an ecosystem depend on the fire regime, vegetation type, climate, physical environments, and the scale of time and space of assessment. More ecosystem-specific studies are needed in future, especially those focusing on temporal and spatial variations of fire effects through long-term experimental monitoring and modeling.

Impact of fire disturbance on soil thermal and carbon dynamics in Alaskan Tundra and Boreal forest ecosystems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Jiang, Y.; Rastetter, E.; Shaver, G. R.; Rocha, A. V.

2012-12-01

In Alaska, fire disturbance is a major component influencing the soil water and energy balance in both tundra and boreal forest ecosystems. Fire-caused changes in soil environment further affect both above- and below-ground carbon cycles depending on different fire severities. Understanding the effects of fire disturbance on soil thermal change requires implicit modeling work on the post-fire soil thawing and freezing processes. In this study, we model the soil temperature profiles in multiple burned and non-burned sites using a well-developed soil thermal model which fully couples soil water and heat transport. The subsequent change in carbon dynamics is analyzed based on site level observations and simulations from the Multiple Element Limitation (MEL) model. With comparison between burned and non-burned sites, we compare and contrast fire effects on soil thermal and carbon dynamics in continuous permafrost (Anaktuvik fire in north slope), discontinuous permafrost (Erickson Creek fire at Hess Creek) and non-permafrost zone (Delta Junction fire in interior Alaska). Then we check the post-fire recovery of soil temperature profiles at sites with different fire severities in both tundra and boreal forest fire areas. We further project the future changes in soil thermal and carbon dynamics using projected climate data from Scenarios Network for Alaska & Arctic Planning (SNAP). This study provides information to improve the understanding of fire disturbance on soil thermal and carbon dynamics and the consequent response under a warming climate.

Regulatory fire test requirements for plutonium air transport packages : JP-4 or JP-5 vs. JP-8 aviation fuel.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Figueroa, Victor G.; Lopez, Carlos; Nicolette, Vernon F.

2010-10-01

For certification, packages used for the transportation of plutonium by air must survive the hypothetical thermal environment specified in 10CFR71.74(a)(5). This regulation specifies that 'the package must be exposed to luminous flames from a pool fire of JP-4 or JP-5 aviation fuel for a period of at least 60 minutes.' This regulation was developed when jet propellant (JP) 4 and 5 were the standard jet fuels. However, JP-4 and JP-5 currently are of limited availability in the United States of America. JP-4 is very hard to obtain as it is not used much anymore. JP-5 may be easier to getmore » than JP-4, but only through a military supplier. The purpose of this paper is to illustrate that readily-available JP-8 fuel is a possible substitute for the aforementioned certification test. Comparisons between the properties of the three fuels are given. Results from computer simulations that compared large JP-4 to JP-8 pool fires using Sandia's VULCAN fire model are shown and discussed. Additionally, the Container Analysis Fire (CAFE) code was used to compare the thermal response of a large calorimeter exposed to engulfing fires fueled by these three jet propellants. The paper then recommends JP-8 as an alternate fuel that complies with the thermal environment implied in 10CFR71.74.« less

Leakage of radioactive materials from particle accelerator facilities by non-radiation disasters like fire and flooding and its environmental impacts

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lee, A.; Jung, N. S.; Mokhtari Oranj, L.; Lee, H. S.

2018-06-01

The leakage of radioactive materials generated at particle accelerator facilities is one of the important issues in the view of radiation safety. In this study, fire and flooding at particle accelerator facilities were considered as the non-radiation disasters which result in the leakage of radioactive materials. To analyse the expected effects at each disaster, the case study on fired and flooded particle accelerator facilities was carried out with the property investigation of interesting materials presented in the accelerator tunnel and the activity estimation. Five major materials in the tunnel were investigated: dust, insulators, concrete, metals and paints. The activation levels on the concerned materials were calculated using several Monte Carlo codes (MCNPX 2.7+SP-FISPACT 2007, FLUKA 2011.4c and PHITS 2.64+DCHAIN-SP 2001). The impact weight to environment was estimated for the different beam particles (electron, proton, carbon and uranium) and the different beam energies (100, 430, 600 and 1000 MeV/nucleon). With the consideration of the leakage path of radioactive materials due to fire and flooding, the activation level of selected materials, and the impacts to the environment were evaluated. In the case of flooding, dust, concrete and metal were found as a considerable object. In the case of fire event, dust, insulator and paint were the major concerns. As expected, the influence of normal fire and flooding at electron accelerator facilities would be relatively low for both cases.

Head Direction Cell Instability in the Anterior Dorsal Thalamus after Lesions of the Interpeduncular Nucleus

PubMed Central

Clark, Benjamin J.; Sarma, Asha; Taube, Jeffrey S.

2009-01-01

Previous research has identified a population of cells throughout the limbic system that discharge as a function of the animals head direction (HD). Altering normal motor cues can alter the HD cell responses and disrupt the updating of their preferred firing directions, thus suggesting that motor cues contribute to processing the HD signal. A pathway that conveys motor information may stem from the interpeduncular nucleus (IPN), a brain region that has reciprocal connections with HD cell circuitry. To test this hypothesis, we produced electrolytic or neurotoxic lesions of the IPN and recorded HD cells in the anterior dorsal thalamus (ADN) of rats. Direction-specific firing remained present in the ADN after lesions of the IPN, but measures of HD cell properties showed that cells had reduced peak firing rates, large directional firing ranges, and firing that predicted the animal’s future heading more than in intact controls. Furthermore, preferred firing directions were moderately less influenced by rotation of a salient visual landmark. Finally, the preferred directions of cells in lesioned rats exhibited large shifts when the animals foraged for scattered food-pellets in a darkened environment and when locomoting from a familiar environment to a novel one. We propose that the IPN contributes motor information about the animal’s movements to the HD cell circuitry. Further, these results suggest that the IPN plays a broad role in the discharge properties and stability of direction-specific activity in the HD cell circuit. PMID:19144850

Development of the GEM-MACH-FireWork System: An Air Quality Model with On-line Wildfire Emissions within the Canadian Operational Air Quality Forecast System

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pavlovic, Radenko; Chen, Jack; Beaulieu, Paul-Andre; Anselmp, David; Gravel, Sylvie; Moran, Mike; Menard, Sylvain; Davignon, Didier

2014-05-01

A wildfire emissions processing system has been developed to incorporate near-real-time emissions from wildfires and large prescribed burns into Environment Canada's real-time GEM-MACH air quality (AQ) forecast system. Since the GEM-MACH forecast domain covers Canada and most of the U.S.A., including Alaska, fire location information is needed for both of these large countries. During AQ model runs, emissions from individual fire sources are injected into elevated model layers based on plume-rise calculations and then transport and chemistry calculations are performed. This "on the fly" approach to the insertion of the fire emissions provides flexibility and efficiency since on-line meteorology is used and computational overhead in emissions pre-processing is reduced. GEM-MACH-FireWork, an experimental wildfire version of GEM-MACH, was run in real-time mode for the summers of 2012 and 2013 in parallel with the normal operational version. 48-hour forecasts were generated every 12 hours (at 00 and 12 UTC). Noticeable improvements in the AQ forecasts for PM2.5 were seen in numerous regions where fire activity was high. Case studies evaluating model performance for specific regions and computed objective scores will be included in this presentation. Using the lessons learned from the last two summers, Environment Canada will continue to work towards the goal of incorporating near-real-time intermittent wildfire emissions into the operational air quality forecast system.

Fuelling the palaeoatmospheric oxygen debate: how much atmospheric oxygen is required for ignition and propagation of smouldering fires?

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Belcher, Claire M.; Hadden, Rory; McElwain, Jennifer C.; Rein, Guillermo

2010-05-01

Fire is a natural process integral to ecosystems at a wide range of temporal and spatial scales and is a key driver of change in the Earth system. Fire has been a major influence on Earth's systems since the Carboniferous. Whilst, climate is considered the ultimate control on global vegetation, fire is now known to play a key role in determining vegetation structure and composition, such that many of the world's ecosystems can be considered fire-dependant. Products of fire include chars, soots and aromatic hydrocarbon species all of which can be traced in ancient through to modern sediments. Atmospheric oxygen has played a key role in the development of life on Earth, with the rise of oxygen in the Precambrian being closely linked to biological evolution. Variations in the concentration of atmospheric oxygen throughout the Phanerozoic are predicted from models based on geochemical cycling of carbon and sulphur. Such models predict that low atmospheric oxygen concentrations prevailed in the Mesozoic (251-65ma) and have been hypothesised to be the primary driver of at least two of the ‘big five' mass extinction events in the Phanerozoic. Here we assess the levels of atmospheric oxygen required to ignite a fire and infer the likely levels of atmospheric oxygen to support smouldering combustion. Smouldering fire dynamics and its effects on ecosystems are very different from flaming fires. Smouldering fires propagate slowly, are usually low in temperature and represent a flameless form of combustion. These fires creep through organic layers of forest ground and peat lands and are responsible for a large fraction of the total biomass consumed in wildfires globally and are also a major contributor of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. Once ignited, they can persist for long periods of time (months, years) spreading over very extensive areas of forest and deep into soil. Smouldering fires are therefore, the oldest continuously burning fires on Earth. We have combined expertise from both the Earth science and fire engineering disciplines to develop realistic ignition mechanisms and measurements of fire propagation within different levels of atmospheric oxygen. We present data from experimental burns run in the fully controlled and realistic atmospheric environment of the UCD PÉAC facility. The burns are designed to develop our understanding of ignition of fires in the natural world. We have studied ignition and propagation of fire in peat, a natural and highly flammable substance. Peat samples of approximately 100mm by 100mm in cross section and 50mm in depth were exposed to an ignition source (~100W of electric power) for 30 minutes. Thermocouples were placed throughout the sample to measure temperature changes during the initial 30 minute ignition phase and in order to observe ignition of the peat, intensity of combustion and spread of the smouldering front within the different atmospheric oxygen settings. We show that ignition and propagation of smouldering in peat does not occur below 16% atmospheric oxygen and that smouldering combustion continues for long periods (~4 hours in the size sample used) at 18% atmospheric oxygen and above. This suggests that atmospheric levels above 16% atmospheric are required to allow ignition and propagation of smouldering fires and that frequent occurrences of wildfires might only be expected in the geological past when atmospheric levels were above 18% oxygen. Fires play an important role in Earth's biogeochemical cycles; this work suggests that fire feedbacks into the Earth system would likely have been suppressed during periods of low atmospheric oxygen.

Reduction of Fire Hazard in Materials for Irrigators and Water Collectors in Cooling Towers

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Smirnov, N. V.; Konstantinova, N. I., E-mail: konstantinova-n@inbox.ru; Gordon, E. P.

A way of reducing the fire hazard of PVC film used to make cooling-tower irrigators and water collectors is examined. A new generation of fire retardant, nanostructured magnesium hydroxide, is used to impart fire retardant properties. The fabrication technology is optimized with a roller-calendering manufacturing technique, and the permissible ranges of fire hazard indicators for materials in irrigators and water collectors are determined.

Estimation of fire danger in Hawai'i using limited weather data and simulation

Treesearch

D.R. Weise; S.L. Stephens; F.M. Fujioka; T.J. Moody; J. Benoit

2010-01-01

The presence of fire in Hawai'i has increased with introduction of nonnative grasses. Fire danger estimation using the National Fire Danger Rating System (NFDRS) typically requires 5 to 10 yr of data to determine percentile weather values and fire activity. The U.S. Army Pōhakuloa Training Area in Hawai‘i is located in the interface zone between windward...