GIS Work

Wildfires have been a constant throughout the observable history of the Gila National Forest (NM, USA). These fires, whether they were started by lighting or humans, have forced the landscape and humans to adapt and deal with routine disturbances every fire season.

GIS can help us to plan for these fires by looking at their past footprints. Our ability to map these fires using handheld GPS devices and infrared sensors allows us to see where past fires have burned and predict where future fires will occur.

This map illustrates the fire history on the Gila National Forest using a dataset obtained by the US Forest Service. The size classes are organized to match federal standards and the colors differentiate the class sizes.

The data shows some of the more intense fire behavior has occurred on the southern half of the forest and the chart shows that 2012 was the most active fire season on record (that year the Whitewater-Baldy complex burned almost 300,000 acres alone).

Map published 07/13/2022. Data sourced from USFS.

Teams working on wildfires produce a multitude of maps daily that each serve their own specific purpose. These maps can range in detail and purpose all the way from the extremely busy operations map that shows roads, dozer lines, escape routes, helispots, water sources, etc. that is primarily utilized by firefighters actively fighting the flames on the ground to the transportation map which only reveals primary roads and landmarks relevant to drivers on the incident.

This map here is just one of the maps produced on a daily basis, the fire progression map. This map is used to show how the fires edge has moved over the past operational periods to give a sense of what fire behavior was seen over a period of time.

To create this map I utilized polygon data that showed the daily fire edge perimeter. Typically this data was collected from an infrared sensor on a contractor plane that would fly the fire and obtain the data overnight. I would first create a file geodatabase to contain all of the daily progression layers. Next, I would add the latest fire perimeter polygon layer to my project's map. I would then open up a custom geoprocessing toolbox which would run a script to update the latest fire progression feature class by taking the latest fire perimeter feature class and adding it onto the most recent fire progression feature class. Once this script was finished I then changed the symbology to create an image that showed the older areas of the fire as a cooler blue color whereas the more recently burned areas of the fire were shown as a warmer red. Then, to add a finishing touch, I would add a layer blend to the fire polygon to emphasize the terrain features that the fire area had covered.

Map published 10/04/2021. Special thanks and credit to the Southwest Area Incident Management Team 2 for the opportunity to train with them.