• Journal of Wetlands Research
• /
• v.26 no.3
• /
• pp.204-218
• /
• 2024

In this study, we evaluate the applicability of domestic and international forest fire indices in Korea. To accomplish this objective, we first compare the structures of widely-used forest fire indices worldwide. Then, the application results of these forest fire indices are evaluated by comparing them with the annual and seasonal variations in actual forest fire occurrences in Korea. Finally, we select indices suitable for domestic application and propose directions to improve their appropriate applicabilities. The considered forest fire indices include MI, KBDI, FFWI, and mFFWI developed in the United States, NI, ZhI, and MNI developed in Russia, and DWI developed in Korea. This study considers the East Coast region as a study area, and the number of forest fire occurrences is referenced from the forestry statistics yearbook provided by the Korea Forest Service. As results, first, most forest fire indices do not adequately reproduce the actual annual forest fire occurrences as its variation is so small. However, most indices are found to effectively represent the monthly variations. Based on the correlation analysis between forest fire indices and actual forest fire occurrences, mFFWI, MI, ZhI, and DWI are selected as suitable indices for the East Coast region. However, these indices are still not satisfactory to adequately represent the forest fire occurrences in Korea, suggesting the need for further improvements. Each index has its own different aspects to be improved and, therefore, evaluation of these indices may be available only after further improvements are completed.

• Journal of the Korean Association of Geographic Information Studies
• /
• v.7 no.1
• /
• pp.75-83
• /
• 2004

In Korea the number of forest fire occurrence and its damaged area have increased drastically and the plans for afforestation such as sound erosion control restoration and forestation have performed to restore for forest fire damaged area. In this study fire resistant forest was developed by selecting fire resistance tree species and applying GIS analysis, considering the characteristic of forest fire and location environment in forest fire damaged area along the east coast. Moreover, it showed the possibility of how spatial information technology such as virtual GIS could be applied during restoring forest fire damaged area and approaching landscape ecology researches. Especially the fire resistant forest was established by using GIS analysis against large scaled forest fires then the best forest arrangement was performed through this fire resistant forest species and 3D modeling in study area. In addition, the forest landscape was established through site index on passing years and then 3D topography and tracking simulation, which is very similar to real world, were constructed by using virtual GIS.

• Fire Science and Engineering
• /
• v.19 no.3 s.59
• /
• pp.64-69
• /
• 2005

In order to decrease the area damaged by forest fires and to prevent the occurrence of forest fires, we are making an effort to improve prevention measures for forest fires. The objective of this study is developing the forest fire occurrence probability model by means of forest site characteristics such as soil type, topography, soil texture, slope, and drainage and forest fire sites. Conditional probability analysis and GIS were used in developing the forest fire occurrence probability model that was used in the classification of forest fire occurrence risk regions.

• Journal of the Korean Wood Science and Technology
• /
• v.42 no.2
• /
• pp.157-162
• /
• 2014

This study was conducted to examine the functionality of the fire retardant treated wood. The hygroscopic property, leaching resistance, metal corrosive efficacy and gas toxicity of retardant treated wood were analyzed. Sodium silicate was penetrated to the wood for making fire retardant treated wood. The subsequent treatment agents such as boric acid, ammonium borate, di-ammonium phosphate were treated after sodium silicate treatment due to fixation. As results for the test, the leaching resist was improved by subsequent treatment. The fire retardant combination such as sodium silicate, boric acid and di-ammonium phosphate showed high hygroscopic property, metal corrosive efficacy. The gas toxicity was also satisfied KS standard.

• Journal of Korean Society for Geospatial Information Science
• /
• v.24 no.4
• /
• pp.3-11
• /
• 2016

Sixty four percent of Korean territory consists of forest which is fragile for forest fire. However, it is difficult to detect the disaster-induced damages due to topographic complexity in mountainous areas and harsh weather conditions. For this reason, satellite imaging systems have been widely utilized to detect the damage caused by forest fire. In particular, ground vegetation condition can be estimated from multi-spectral satellite images and change detection technique has been used to detect forest fire damages. However, since Korea has clear four seasons, simple change detection technique has limitation. In this regard, this study applied the NDVI(normalized difference vegetation index) annual cycle modeling technique on time-series of Landsat images from 1991 to 2007 to analyze influence of forest fire of Yangyang-gun, Gangwon-do in 2005 on vegetation condition. The encouraging result was obtained when comparing the areas where forest fire occurs with non-damaged areas. The mean value of NDVI was decreased by 0.07 before and after the forest fire. On the other hand, annual variability of NDVI had been increasing and peak value of NDVI was stationary after the forest fire. It is interpreted that understory vegetation was seriously damaged from the forest fire occurred in 2005.

• Fire Science and Engineering
• /
• v.24 no.1
• /
• pp.103-110
• /
• 2010

Farming activity was the second cause of forest fire following the carelessness. In this study, 74 forest fires caused by farming activity and waste burning in 2009 was investigated for analyzing ignition patterns. The main cause to bring about forest fire was the farming waste burning as 25 cases, burning of farming waste matter after product and household waste burning were the second causes as 19 cases. Landcovers which transfer flame from ignition point to forest were fallow field graveyard, field fruit farm, field levee fallow field. The average distance between ignition point and forest sleeve was 19 m, and the maximum distance was 130 m. The probability of forest fire ignition was high in the 100 m buffer zone from the forest sleeve that is the prohibition rule of fire use for forest fire prevention at the forest fire season.

• Journal of the Korea Safety Management & Science
• /
• v.18 no.3
• /
• pp.9-15
• /
• 2016

Currently the forest area is 6,370,000 hectare (ha) which occupies 63.7% in Korea. The forest has good functions such as production of forest products, conservation of national land, prevention of disasters, etc. However constructing houses near the forest area make bad situation like illegal waste incineration by resident. So research subject is forest fire caused by waste incineration place including facility. And this study was conducted about statistical analysis and research analysis of the 100 waste incineration places including facilities at the country town. Statistical analysis shows that March is 27% which percentage is the highest number of forest fire in 10 years' average. The number of forest fire caused by waste incineration is 45 which is the third highest number in the fire statistic. The distance between waste incineration place including facility and forest area is 30m, 40m and 50m. That 40m (36%) is the most common distance from forest area. The types of waste incineration are ground (62%), the temporary facility made with oil drum can (35%) and other made with steel sheet, concrete, etc. The result of this study is that government and local government must conduct the improvement measure to reduce illegal incineration such as waste pickup area made with rain and wind proof type installed near residence, expenses for waste treatment, enlightenment and training, etc. Also considering their age and income are needed for realistic improvement.

• Korean Journal of Agricultural and Forest Meteorology
• /
• v.8 no.4
• /
• pp.250-259
• /
• 2006

This study looks into forest fire occurrence hazards according to the change of temperature and humidity over thirty years at interval of ten days. We used data from the forest fire inventory from 1995 to 2004 and weather data such as average temperature and relative humidity for 30 years from 1971 to 2000. These data were expressed as a database with ten-day intervals for 76 weather stations. Forest fire hazards occurred in the spring season from the end of March to the middle of April. For the first step, the primitive surface of temperature and humidity was interpolated by IDW (the standard interpolation method). These thematic maps have a 1 km by 1 km grid spacing resolution. Next, we executed a simple regression analysis after extracting forest fire frequency, temperature and humidity values from 76 weather stations. The results produced a coefficient of determination ($R^2$) ranging from 0.4 to 0.6. Moreover, the estimation of forest fire occurrence hazards during early April was very high at Gyeongbuk Interior, Chungcheong Interior and part of Gangwon. The range of temperature and humidity having an influence on forest fire occurrence was as follows: average temperature and relative humidity in early April was $9-12^{\circ}C$ and 61-65%. At the end of March, temperature was $6-10^{\circ}C$, humidity 62-67%, and temperature was $11-14^{\circ}C$ and humidity 60-67% in the middle of April.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Hazard Mitigation
• /
• v.4 no.1 s.12
• /
• pp.57-64
• /
• 2004

Recent abnormal weather condition and accompanying increase in forest fire require more study on the effect of forest fire on the stability of mountain slopes. The aims of this paper are to investigate how destroy of trees caused by forest fire influences the stability of mountain slopes and to propose a safety evaluation method for mountain slopes considering the effect of forest fire, in order to minimize the expected damage due to forest fire. To accomplish this aim, the effects of forest fire on the stability of mountain slopes are analyzed in quantitative way, and a slope stability chart is proposed as a result.

• Journal of Korean Society of Forest Science
• /
• v.102 no.3
• /
• pp.415-419
• /
• 2013

To mitigate forest fire damage, it is needed to concentrate suppression resources on the fire having a high probability to become large in the initial stage. The objective of this study is to develop the large fire judgement model which can estimate large fire possibility index between the fire size and the related factors such as weather, terrain, and fuel. The results of logistic regression equation indicated that temperature, wind speed, continuous drought days, slope variance, forest area were related to the large fire possibility positively but elevation has negative relationship. This model may help decision-making about size of suppression resources, local residents evacuation and suppression priority.