Related Experiment Video
Updated: Mar 10, 2026

Wind Tunnel Experiments to Study Chaparral Crown Fires
Published on: November 14, 2017
A system to evaluate fire impacts from simulated fire behavior in Mediterranean areas of Central Chile
Miguel E Castillo1, Juan R Molina2, Francisco Rodríguez Y Silva2
1Fire Management Laboratory, Faculty of Forest Sciences and Nature Conservation, University of Chile, P. Box 9206, Santiago, Chile.
Abstract:
Wildfires constitute the greatest economic disruption to Mediterranean ecosystems, from a socio-economic and ecological perspective (Molina et al., 2014). This study proposes to classify fire intensity levels based on potential fire behavior in different types of Mediterranean vegetation types, using two geographical scales. The study considered >4 thousand wildfires over a period of 25years, identifying fire behavior on each event, based on simulations using "KITRAL", a model developed in Chile in 1993 and currently used in the entire country. Fire intensity values allowed results to be classified into six fire effects categories (levels), each of them with field indicators linking energy values with damage related to burned vegetation and wildland urban interface zone. These indicators also facilitated a preliminary assessment of wildfire impact on different Mediterranean land uses and, are therefore, a useful tool to prioritize future interventions.
More Related Videos
Related Concept Videos
Flame Photometry: Overview
Habitat Fragmentation
Responses to Drought and Flooding
Conduction, Convection and Radiation: Problem Solving
In order to solve a problem related to heat transfer, first of all, the situation needs to be examined to determine the type of heat transfer involved. This could...
Global Climate Change
Calorimetry

