Research Database
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Should I Stay or Should I Go Now? Or Should I Wait and See? Influences on Wildfire Evacuation Decisions
Year: 2017
As climate change has contributed to longer fire seasons and populations living in fire-prone ecosystems increase, wildfires have begun to affect a growing number of people. As a result, interest in understanding the wildfire evacuation decision process has increased. Of particular interest is understanding why some people leave early, some choose to stay and defend their homes, and others wait to assess conditions before making a final decision. Individuals who tend to wait and see are of particular concern given the dangers of late evacuation. To understand what factors might influence…
Publication Type: Journal Article
A LiDAR-based analysis of the effects of slope, vegetation density, and ground surface roughness on travel rates for wildland firefighter escape route mapping
Year: 2017
Escape routes are essential components of wildland firefighter safety, providing pre-defined pathways to a safety zone. Among the many factors that affect travel rates along an escape route, landscape conditions such as slope, low-lying vegetation density, and ground surface roughness are particularly influential, and can be measured using airborne light detection and ranging (LiDAR) data. In order to develop a robust, quantitative understanding of the effects of these landscape conditions on travel rates, we performed an experiment wherein study participants were timed while walking along a…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Efficacy of resource objective wildfires for restoration of ponderosa pine (Pinus ponderosa) forests in northern Arizona
Year: 2017
Current conditions in dry forests of the western United State have given rise to policy mandates for accelerated ecological restoration on U.S. National Forest System and other public lands. In southwestern ponderosa pine (Pinus ponderosa Laws.) forests, mechanized tree thinning and prescribed fire are common restoration treatments but are not acceptable for all sites. Currently there is much interest in managing naturally ignited fires to accomplish restoration objectives but few studies have systematically examined the efficacy of such “resource objective” wildfires for restoring historical…
Publication Type: Journal Article