Fire Consortia for Advanced Modeling of Meteorology and Smoke-FCAMMS: a National Paradigm for Wildland Fire and Smoke Management

Abstract

Fires can be catastrophic, but only when the weather permits. Predicting the weather more than a few hours into the future with accuracy, precision and reliability is an on-going challenge to researchers. Accurate and precise forecasting for more than a few hours into the future has been virtually unrealizable until the latter half of the 20th Century. In the modern era, advances in the atmospheric sciences have led to a far greater understanding of the nature of the atmosphere. Recognition of the inherent stochastic nature of atmospheric circulation, advances in the abilities of modern computers to simulate the earth system, weather observation and communication networks and satellite remote sensing have combined to advance the ability to predict weather and its consequences far better than was possible a few years ago. The USDA Forest Service has developed FCAMMS as an effort to capitalize on these advances and provide information to fire managers and others on a real-time basis using the communications capabilities of the World Wide Web. This job is certainly much too big for the USDA Forest Service alone, indeed for the land management community alone. Thus, the FCAMMS are designed as massively collaborative partnerships, relying on global scale weather information from sister federal agencies (NOAA, NASA, military) and the scientific resources of those agencies, universities, and national laboratories. To insure that FCAMMS products are useful for managers in the "real world," each FCAMMS also includes operational advisors and users to provide guidance on the types of products produced and feedback on accuracy.

Citation

Riebau, A. R.; Fox, D. G. 2003. Fire Consortia for Advanced Modeling of Meteorology and Smoke-FCAMMS: a National Paradigm for Wildland Fire and Smoke Management. In: 2d International Wildland Fire Ecology and Fire Management Congress: 5th Symposium on Fire Meteorology; 2003 Novenber 16-20; Orlando, FL. Boston, MA: American Meteorological Society: J12.1.