Efficiency Evaluation of Dong Model for Determination of Fire Risk Potential in Zarrin Abad Forests

Document Type : Research article

Authors

PhD student, Forestry Department, Sari Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources University, I.R. Iran

Abstract

Continues occurrence of fire in northern forests of Iran during past years, necessitates conducting research, in order to predict future fire occurrence in these forests. For this reason a 1:25000 topographical map of Zarrin Abad Forests of Neka Township of Mazandaran province of I.R. Iran. was geo-referenced in GIS, firstly. Then digital model of elevation (DEM) with 30-meter pixel size was obtained from the geo-referenced map and slope, aspect and elevation maps were developed from the DEM. The vegetation cover density and residential areas (villages) maps were obtained from Nekachoob Corporation Company and digitized in GIS. All roads in the study area were routed using GPS and their map was developed. Then 200 and 500 meter buffers were considered on the maps, around the roads and the villages. All of the digital layers were classified according to Dong model. The fire potential map with five classes was developed by overlaying all of the maps, in GIS environment and allocating weight to each factor (map), regarding the Dong model. The past forest fires map was developed, using actual forest data and applying ground sampling with GPS. Then this map was overlaid on the forest fire potential map. Results showed that about 40 percent of the past forest fire areas are located on sites with very high or high fire risk which indicates the medium validity of the used model. Thus, Dong model was modified and weight of the layers was changed, based on their importance at the studied area and finally a new model was developed. A new fire potential map was generated, based on the modified model and was overlaid on the past forest fires map. Results showed that about 80 percent of the past forest fire areas are located on sites with very high or high fire risk which indicates a high validity of the used model for the studied area. It seems that the model might be applied for other forest sites at Caspian region of Iran, based on spatial locations of their watershed basins.

Keywords

References

- Akpinar, E. and Usul, N., 2003. GIS and forest fire. Project of INTA SpaceTurk, Engineering Department, Middle East Technical University, 11 p.
- Anonymous, 2010. Zarrinabad-Neka Forest Management Project. Nowshahr Natural Resources General Office, I.R. Iran, 109 p.
- Chuvieco, E. and Congalton. R.G., 1989. Application of remote sensing and geographic information systems to forest fire hazard mapping. Remote Sensing of the Environment, 29: 147-159.
- Dong, X.U., Li-min, D., Guo-fan, Sh., Lei, T. and Hui, W., 2005. Forest fire risk zone mapping from satellite images and GIS for Baihe Forestry Bureau, Jilin, China. Journal of Forestry Research, 16(3): 169-174.
- Encinas, A.H., Encinas, L.H., White, S.H., Del Rey, A.M. and Sanchez, G.R., 2007. Simulation of forest fire fronts using cellular automata. Advanced Engineering Software, 38: 372–378.
- Hoshyarkhah, B. and Jamshidi Alashti, R., 2007. Fire regimes in forests and strategies of opposition with that. Proceeding of the Second Conference on Opposition with Natural Accidents, Tehran, Iran, 26-28 Dec. 2007: 25-34.
- Jaiswal, R.K., Mukherjee, S., Raju, D.K. and Saxena, R., 2002. Forest fire risk zone mapping from satellite imagery and GIS. International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation, 4: 1-10.
- Kazemi, S. M., 2005. Fire and forest ecosystems. Livestock, industry and culture journal: 79-81.
- Lee, B.S., Alexander, M.E., Hawkes, B.C., Lynham, T.J., Stocks, B.J. and Englefield, P., 2002. Information systems in support of wildland fire management decision making in Canada. Computers and Electronics in Agriculture, 37: 185-198.
- Maeda, E.E., Arcoverde, G.F.B., Pellikka, P.K.E. and Shimabukuro, Y.E., 2011. Fire risk assessment in the Brazilian Amazon using MODIS imagery and change vector analysis. Applied Geography, 31: 76-84.
- Mahdavi A., Fallahshamsi, R., Nazari, R. and Heidari, M., 2011. Provision of fire risk map in forest and pasture lands in Ilam city using AHP. Proceeding of the First International Conference on Fire in Natural Resources, Gorgan, Iran, 26-28 Oct. 2011: 65-78.
- Marozas, V., Racinskas, J. and Bartkevicius, E., 2007. Dynamics of ground vegetation after surface fires in hemiboreal Pinus sylvestris forests. Forest Ecology and Management, 250(1-2): 47–55.
- Mohammadi, F., Shabanian, N., Pourhashemi, M. and Fatehi, P., 2010. Risk zone mapping of forest fire using GIS and AHP in a part of Paveh forests. Iranian Journal of Forest and Poplar Research, 18(4): 569-586.
- Paz, Sh., Carmel, Y., Jahshan, F. and Shoshany, M., 2011. Post-fire analysis of pre-fire mapping of fire-risk: a recent case study from Mt. Carmel (Israel). Forest Ecology and Management, 262: 1184–1188.
- Podur, J., Martell, D.L. and Knight, K., 2002. Statistical quality control analysis of forest fire activity in Canada. Canadian Journal Forest Research, 32: 195–205.
- Salamati, H., Mostafalou, H., Mastoori, A. and Honardoost, F., 2011. Evaluation and provision of forest fire risk map using GIS in Golestan forests. Proceeding of the First International Conference on Fire in Natural Resources, Gorgan, Iran, 26-28 Oct. 2011: 37-47.
- Sowmya, S.V. and Somashekar, R. K., 2010. Application of remote sensing and geographical information system in mapping forest fire risk zone at Bhadra wildlife sanctuary, India. Journal of Environmental Biology, 31(6): 969-974.
 
 
Iranian Journal of Forest and Poplar Research
Volume 21, Issue 3 - Serial Number 3
December 2013
Pages 439-451

Files

Share

How to cite

Statistics