Overview of the Fire service
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The fire service is based on the Advanced Fire Information System (AFIS) of South Africa. The so-called AFIS field terminal, comprising a EUMETCast antenna and a PC for data acquisition and processing, has been developed for users that need near real time fire information in remote areas where Internet access is limited or unavailable.
The field terminal enables the user to pre-define the type of vegetation fires to be alerted to for the users area of interest (e.g. rangeland, forest and agricultural land). The system’s ability to provide immediate classification to the vegetation type that the fire is burning in sets it aside for any other fire information system and will help improve fire management.
The MODIS sensor on board of the polar orbiting Terra and Aqua Satellites can detect fires with high precision four times a day. These data are received by a specific station located at CSIR (Pretoria, South Africa) and coupled with observations at 15 minutes intervals from METEOSAT Second Generation (MSG) to produce Fire products. |
With the detection of a fire, e-mail and SMS text messages are immediately sent to the affected parties.
Additional to the active fire information the user also receives a forecast of fire danger. Two fire danger indices are used, the Lowveld Fire Danger Index as well as the McArthur Forest Fire Danger Index. Both indices are represented as a colour map with five classes of fire danger as forecasted for 14:00 local time.
And in order to assess the damage after the fire also a monthly Burnt Area map based upon MODIS is distributed.
These 3 maps (before, during and after the fire) give a full picture for Ministries of Environment to set up a Fire Information Management plan, as was for example successfully done in Botswana under the Ministry of Environment, Wildlife and National Parks.
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Their day-to-day fire management tool serves as a decision basis to determine the personnel and staff need for fire prevention and detection activities, the readiness of prevention and suppression forces, to strengthen the initial attack of fire control forces and to reimburse farmers after the event.
 Fire Danger Index |
See also Fire Service Products and User Community
See also Fire Products
See also Long Range Forecast Support Service
