U.S. flag An official website of the United States government.
Official websites use .gov

A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.

Secure .gov websites use HTTPS

A lock ( ) or https:// means you've safely connected to the .gov website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.

i

Comparing ground-based lightning detection networks near wildfire points-of-origin



Details

  • Journal Title:
    Natural Hazards
  • Personal Author:
  • NOAA Program & Office:
    CIRA (Cooperative Institute for Research in the Atmosphere)
  • Description:
    Lightning detection and attribution to wildfire ignitions is a critical component of fire management worldwide to both reduce hazards of wildfire to values-at-risk and to enhance the potential for wildland fire to provide resource benefits in fire-adapted ecosystems. We compared two operational ground-based lightning detection networks used by fire managers to identify cloud-to-ground strokes within operationally-relevant distances (1.6 km) of the origins of 4408 western United States lightning-ignited wildfires spanning May–September 2020. Applying two sets of constraints–varying holdover time and applying a quality control measure–we found strokes were co-detected near 55–65% of fires, increasing to 65–79% for detection by at least one network, with neither network detecting lightning near 1024–1666 fires. Because each network detected strokes near 136–376 unique fires, the use of both networks is suggested to increase the probability of identifying potential fire starts. Given the number of fires with network-unique detections and no detections by either network, improvements in lightning detection networks are recommended given increasing fire hazard.
  • Source:
    Natural Hazards, 120(14), 13617-13626
  • DOI:
  • ISSN:
    0921-030X ; 1573-0840
  • Format:
    pdf
  • Publisher:
    Springer Science and Business Media LLC
  • Document Type:
    Journal Article
  • License:
  • Rights Information:
    CC BY
  • Compliance:
    Library
  • Main Document Checksum:
    urn:sha-512:7ccf0bb1ab2d93a8a50fef4af224add617ff93f8f02722ccd211bcef2ef759f0a1ea901c0b03c2edf1cb5a5a3d2f1c18e751138e6e803431d34bc8f3bb050a46
  • Download URL:
  • File Type:
    Filetype[PDF - 2.75 MB ]
PREVIOUS
ON THIS PAGE
Details
The NOAA IR serves as an archival repository of NOAA-published products including scientific findings, journal articles, guidelines, recommendations, or other information authored or co-authored by NOAA or funded partners. As a repository, the NOAA IR retains documents in their original published format to ensure public access to scientific information.
BACK TO TOP