Development of forest fire risk map using geographical information systems and remote sensing capabilities: Ören case

Area of Science:

• Environmental Science
• Forestry
• Remote Sensing

Background:

• Global forest fires cause significant environmental damage, including deforestation and climate change.
• Turkey has experienced a 58% rise in forest fires between 1988 and 2018, necessitating risk assessment.
• Effective forest fire mitigation strategies are vital for Turkey's ecological and economic stability.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and implement a forest fire risk map for the Kütahya-Ören region in Turkey.
• To assess the visibility of the study area from existing fire towers.
• To validate the accuracy of the created fire risk map using remote sensing data of a past fire event.

Main Methods:

• Geographical Information System (GIS) capabilities were employed for spatial data analysis to create the forest fire risk map.
• Visibility analysis was conducted for current fire towers to determine their coverage.
• Remote sensing techniques were used to detect and quantify the actual burned area from a 2001 fire incident.

Main Results:

• The forest fire risk map identified 36.86% as very-high and high-risk, 60.39% as moderate-risk, and 2.76% as low-risk zones.
• Visibility analysis indicated that 82.8% of the study region was observable from the fire towers.
• Remote sensing detected 5.6 hectares of burned area, exceeding the official record of 4 hectares, with 83% falling into moderate-risk and 17% into very-high/high-risk zones.

Conclusions:

• The study successfully generated a forest fire risk map for the Kütahya-Ören region, highlighting significant areas of concern.
• The findings underscore the importance of integrating GIS and remote sensing for accurate forest fire risk assessment and management.
• The discrepancy between recorded and actual burned areas suggests a need for improved monitoring and validation methods in forest fire management.