Could Someone Give me Advice on Tracking Real-Time Wildfire Behavior?

Hello there, :wave:

I am relatively new to using this forum; but I have already seen how knowledgeable and supportive this community is, so I figured this would be the best place to ask for advice.

I have recently started volunteering with a local wildfire preparedness group in my area; and one of my responsibilities is monitoring wildfires to help our community stay informed. While I have been using resources like Cal Fires incident pages; I have noticed that this forum often has much more timely and detailed information about active wildfires.

Are there specific apps; maps; or websites that you recommend for tracking wildfire activity in real time? I have heard mixed things about Windy and GOES satellite data.

For those who use radio scanners; do you have advice on frequencies to tune into or how to interpret chatter effectively?

Sometimes I see terms like spotting; backing fire; or crossover potential in discussions here. Is there a guide or resource you would recommend for learning this kind of terminology? :thinking:

Also, I have gone through this post; https://forums.wildfireintel.org/t/could-someone-guide-me-with-the-information-on-recent-wildfire-activity-rpa-uipath which definitely helped me out a lot

For people like me who are relaying information to others; do you have tips on verifying accuracy and avoiding misinformation when wildfires are rapidly evolving? :thinking:

Thanks in advance for your help and assistance.

Start with the Watch Duty App

3 Likes

Like @Flyron said Watch Duty is an excellent application with many of the same contributors on here feeding watch duty.

As far as mapping goes, watch duty has access to same data the people on here do. What I would caution you with and for you to get a good understanding of is what the source of the data is.

You mentioned some satellite data like GOES/VIIRS/MODIS. With that comes two sets of resolution the first is Spatial Resolution aka how accurate was it, with a sensor in space looking at pixel radiance for MODIS 1 pixel could be anywhere in 1000 square meters, VIIRS 375 meters so on so forth. So I caution you with using this data alone without understanding it and that these thermal sensors can detect heat in the smoke column which can make you think a fire is much larger than it is sometimes.

The second resolution is temporal resolution aka time - is this a sensor that passes over an area in an orbit over the poles aka polar orbit over a set time or is this a sensor that is in orbit with the earth aka geostationary. All this goes into how fresh or stale the data is depending on how you want to look at it. Also a factor is once it captures the data how long does it take to process it and publish it.

So here is an example, a satellite with a very coarse spatial resolution but fine temporal resolution can let you know you have an ignition in let say 1000 square meter within 2 minutes of detection.

In California we have three crewed aircraft platforms with very high resolution sensors on them that fly over a fire during an initial attack fire.

  1. CAL-OES FIRIS Program - Two aircraft one in Sac one in Chino that will fly a fire, map it and transmit it while airborne still over the fire using sat-comms. The data is made available to the public rapidly by a KML network link and arcgis feature service. They can also transmit live goesptatial video for using applications like the Team Awareness Kit. There is a thread on TAK on this website.

  2. CAL-FIRE AIR INTEL Program - very similar they have one configured aircraft now but also have sub contractors for when things get busy. They also map the incident while airborne and network willing (not sure if satcomms is done yet) transmit this out for rapid sharing to the public via arcgis feature service. I take that and make it into public KML network link for TAK. I dont think CAL-FIRE is doing live video yet but IIRC that is on the punch list.

  3. USFS Firewatch Program - Basically same as the first two but that data is not shared publicly. Now one of these fire permiters might make is as the perimeter to one of their daily published maps.

A federal program called NIROPS does nightly flights and sends these to the incident management teams for mapping. This is high spatial resolution but low temporal resolution, these are not done during initial attack.

My opinion is that watch duty does a pretty good job at providing accurate and timely data to the public to help them make informed decisions. As always follow your local law enforcement on the evacuations etc.

5 Likes

The most real time is looking at a camera and if you’re in California there are plenty.

https://ops.alertcalifornia.org/cameras

Here’s when the creek fire started it’s big run.

https://x.com/ALERTCalifornia/status/1310232736783720451/mediaViewer?currentTweet=1310232736783720451&currentTweetUser=ALERTCalifornia

1 Like

The NWCG official glossary of wildland fire terms is here:

Often folks are listening to online scanners through broadcastify. If you have an actual scanner, which specific frequencies you may want to listen to depend on your area and the agencies involved.

Edit: is this related to your last question form June?

1 Like

This link will allow you to view historical fire maps, out side of anomaly, future fires will often spread similarly.

Take some online free courses like NWCG S190 and 130, FEMA 100 and 200. Just a basic taste so you have some familiarity with what your hearing.

YouTube can be a wealth of knowledge and understanding. Watch some operational briefings, watch some pio updates. Watch some historical fire footage, some of the lessons learned, watch some fire behavior.

When you get the itch, CAL FIRE and the USFS is always hiring😂

2 Likes

That is a great suggestion. Online NWCG training can be found at the Wildland Fire Learning Portal:
https://www.wildlandfirelearningportal.net/login/index.php

Incident Command System (ICS) online training can be found at the FEMA Emergency Management Institute Independent Study Program:
https://training.fema.gov/is/crslist.aspx?lang=en&all=true

2 Likes

Caltopo is a great mapping tool with everything from historic fire perimeters to government land boundary layers. The topo map layers give you perspectives hear a specific area or road mentioned. With all of that you can get timeline of how long it’s been since the last fire.

https://caltopo.com/map.html#

1 Like