The use of the satellite imagery for the assessment of the forest fire danger

Abstract

In the article the possibility of using satellite imagery of Landsat 8 for assessing forest fire danger is considered. As a software platform for assessing the fire danger the geographic information systems with a number of plugins were used. To assess the forest fire danger it is suggested to calculate the spectral indices and surface temperat ure according to the satellite imagery. It was calculated the following indices: the vegetation index NDVI (EVI), NDWI an d TVDI. It was necessary to calculate the aver-age values of the indices for the whole object of ev aluation of forest fire situation. A comparison of mean values of data indices with their values for individual sites and the definition of fire danger for these sites were carried out. The in terpolation of the obtained values of fire danger areas within the boundaries of forest inventory sub-compartment (forest compartment) was done. As a result, they were assigned one dominant area fire rating class. The end product is a vector polygon layer of classes of fire danger for every forest stands containing an attribute table of the forest characteristics and classes of fire danger, which will allow to design fire prot ection measures for the purposes of the forestry.