Abstract
Large fires or "megafires" have been a major topic in wildland fire research and management for over a decade. There is great debate regarding the impacts of large fires. Many believe that they (1) are occurring too frequently, (2) are burning abnormally large areas, (3) cause uncharacteristically adverse ecological harm, and (4) must be suppressed at all costs. Others believe that large fires can effectively reintroduce fire back into those declining fire-prone ecosystems where fires have been excluded for decades, thereby (1) improving ecosystem health, (2) reducing future fire hazard, (3) providing critical fuel breaks, and (4) increasing ecosystem resilience in the face of climate change. Adding to the dilemma is the fact that little is known of the short- and long-term ecological impacts of large fires on historical, contemporary, and future landscapes and this lack of knowledge fuels the debate that surrounds both the causes and consequences of large fires. Just because a fire is large doesn't necessarily mean that it is unnatural or undesirable, unless, of course, it threatens human life and property. Large fires may provide unique opportunities to restore ecosystems and treat fuels across extensive areas.
Titles contained within Proceedings of the large wildland fires conference; May 19-23, 2014; Missoula, MT
- Between a rock and a hard place: Toward a more effective protection strategy as wildfire threats intensify
- Fire in Ghana's dry forest: Causes, frequency, effects and management interventions
- Conflicting short and long-term management goals: Fire effects in endangered golden-cheeked warbler (Setophaga chrysoparia) habitat
- Recent findings relating to firefighter safety zones
- Vegetation clearance distances to prevent wildland fire caused damage to telecommunication and power transmission infrastructure
- An exploration of warfighting and firefighting doctrine
- How fuel treatment types, locations, and amounts impact landscape-scale fire behavior and carbon dynamics
- Wildland fire potential: A tool for assessing wildfire risk and fuels management needs
- An analysis of large chaparral fires in San Diego County, CA
- Building Fire Behavior Analyst (FBAN) capability and capacity: Lessons learned From Victoria, Australia's Bushfire Behavior Predictive Services Strategy
- Influence of landscape gradients in wilderness management and spatial climate on fire severity in the Northern Rockies USA, 1984 to 2010
- Mapping landscape fire frequency for fire regime condition class
- Ecological fire use for ecological fire management: Managing large wildfires by design
- Assessing three fuel classification systems and their maps using Forest Inventory and Analysis (FIA) surface fuel measurements
- Creation and implementation of a certification system for insurability and fire risk classification for forest plantations
- Measuring the wildland firefighting safety culture change - an analysis of entrapment rates from 1994 to 2013
- Strategic operations planning - it's not just for wilderness! How the Strategic Operations Planner can help
- Using prescribed fire to reduce the risk of smoke related traffic problems on I-95
- Spatially explicit quantification of heterogeneous fire effects over long time series: Patterns from two forest types in the northern U.S. Rockies
- Effects of bark beetle attack on canopy fuel flammability and crown fire potential in lodgepole pine and Engelmann spruce forests
- Forecasting distribution of numbers of large fires
- Assessing predictive services' 7-day fire potential outlook
- Emerging concepts in wildfire risk assessment and management (Publ.)
- Reconsidering wildland fire use: Perspectives from the Northern Rockies
- Comparison of six fire severity classification methods using Montana and Washington wildland fires
- Fire patterns of South Eastern Queensland in a global context: A review
- Sensitivity to spatial and temporal scale and fire regime inputs in deriving fire regime condition class
- Practical tools for assessing potential crown fire behavior and canopy fuel characteristics
- Contemporary patterns of burn severity heterogeneity from fires in the Northwestern U.S.
- Vegetation clearance distances to prevent wildland fire caused damage to telecommunication and power transmission infrastructure (2)
- What determines area burned in large landscapes? Insights from a decade of comparative landscape-fire modelling
- Fuels treatments in the 21st century - do they matter?
- Enhancing scientist-manager relationships to foster ecosystem resilience
- Influences of previous wildfires on change, resistance, and resilience to reburning in a montane southwestern landscape
- Error associated with model predictions of wildland fire rate of spread
- Modeling the spreading of large-scale wildland fires
- Characterization of the large fire regime in SE France
- A tale of two fires: The relative effectiveness of past wildfires in mitigating wildfire behavior and effects
- Manitoba Health's emerging work on wildland fire smoke
- Temporal changes to fire risk in dissimilar WUI communities
- Assessing Lebanon's wildfire potential in association with current and future climatic conditions
- Initial results from a field experiment to support the assessment of fuel treatment effectiveness in reducing wildfire intensity and spread rate
- Near real-time wildfire mapping using spatially-refined satellite data: The rim fire case study
- Regional likelihood of very large wildfires over the 21st century across the western United States: Motivation to study individual events like the Rim Fire, a unique opportunity with unprecedented remote sensing data
- Characterizing large airtanker use in United States fire management
- Decision making under uncertainty: Recommendations for the Wildland Fire Decision Support System (WFDSS)
- Applying the Wildland Fire Decision Support System (WFDSS) to support risk-informed decision making: The Gold Pan Fire, Bitterroot National Forest, Montana, USA
Keywords
fire ecology,
fire behavior,
smoke management,
fire management,
social and political consequences
Citation
Keane, Robert E.; Jolly, Matt; Parsons, Russell; Riley, Karin. 2015. Proceedings of the large wildland fires conference; May 19-23, 2014; Missoula, MT. Proc. RMRS-P-73. Fort Collins, CO: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station. 345 p.
