• Atmosphere
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.131-141
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• 2013

Many studies have related the recent variations of wildfire regime such as the increasing number of occurrances, their patterns and timing changes, and the severity of their extreme cases with global warming. However, there are only a few numbers of wildfire studies to assess how the future wildfire regime will change in the interactions between land and atmosphere with climate change especially over East Asia. This study was performed to estimate the future changing aspect of wildfire danger with global warming, using Haines Index (HI). Calculated from atmospheric instability and dryness, HI is the potential of an existing fire to become a dangerous wildfire. Using the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model, two separated 5-year simulations of current (1995~1999) and far future (2095~2099) were performed and analyzed. Community Climate System Model 3 (CCSM3) model outputs were utilized for the model inputs for the past and future over East Asia; future prediction was driven under the IPCC A1B scenario. The results indicate changes of the wildfire danger regime, showing overall decreasing the wildfire danger in the future but intensified regional deviations between north and south. The overall changes of the wildfire regime seems to stem from atmospheric dryness which is sensitive to soil moisture variation. In some locations, the future wildfire danger overall decreases in summer but increases in winter or fall when the actual fire occurrence are generally peaked especially in South China.

• Atmosphere
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• v.28 no.4
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• pp.457-467
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• 2018

This study investigated the variability of spring (March-May) forest fire risk in Korea for the period 1991~2017 and analyzed its relationship with large-scale climate factors. The Forest Weather Index (FWI) representing the meteorological risk for forest fire occurrences calculated based on observational data and its relationship with large-scale climate factors were analyzed. We performed the empirical orthogonal function (EOF) analysis on the spring FWI. The leading EOF mode of FWI accounting for about 70% of total variability was found to be highly correlated with total number of forest fire occurrences in Korea. The high FWI, forest fire occurrence risk, in Korea, is associated with warmer atmosphere temperature in midwest Eurasia-China-Korea peninsula, cyclonic circulation anomaly in northeastern China-Korea peninsula-northwest pacific, westerly wind anomaly in central China-Korea peninsula, and low humidity in Korea. These are further related with warmer sea surface temperature and enhanced outgoing longwave radiation over Western Pacific, which represents a typical condition for a La $Ni\tilde{n}a$ episode. This suggests that large-scale climate factors over East Asia and ENSO could have a significant influence on the occurrence of spring forest fires in Korea.

• Korean Journal of Agricultural and Forest Meteorology
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• v.13 no.3
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• pp.148-156
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• 2011

The purpose of this study is to analyze the patterns of forest fire possibly related with Asian dust event and carry out a correlation analysis between forest fire occurrence and existence or not of the Asian dust event during dry seasons i.e. February to May in 2000 to 2008. To study the correlation of forest fire and Asian dust, we surveyed information of Asian dust observations, forest fire statistics, fire danger rating index, weather data such as temperature, relative humidity and wind speed of the day occurring the forest fire. As a consequence of analysis, the regional frequency of Asian dust was the highest in Gyeonggi and Chungbuk divisions. Frequencies of forest fire occurrence by the Asian dust events were the highest in the day before three days of the Asian dust event. The highest frequent regions of forest fire occurrence were district of boundary line between Gyeonggi and Western of Gangwon, Chungbuk and Gyeonbuk inland. The correlation between forest fire and fire danger rating index showed the high correlation with the day before three days and after three days of the Asian dust event. These correlation coefficients were 0.50038 and 0.53978 to 1% significance level. The result of analysis between the frequency of forest fire occurrence and wind speed had a highly negative relationship at all the Asian dust days, the day before and after three days. The correlation coefficients had been -0.58623 to -0.61245 to 1% significance level. Relative humidity showed a little of negative relationship with forest fire occurrence in -0.2568(p ${\leq}$ 0.01) for the Asian dust day and -0.35309(p ${\leq}$ 0.01) for next three days. Moreover, at the day before three days of Asian dust events, it was -0.23701 to 1% significance level. However, the mean temperature did not correlate with frequency of forest fire occurrence by Asian dust events at all.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Safety
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• v.38 no.4
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• pp.39-46
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• 2023

Pine trees, which account for 23% of the forested area of the Republic of Korea, are highly vulnerable to fire in comparison to broad-leaved trees due to the presence of consistent water tube sections throughout the year and resin that is composed of approximately 20% oil. In addition, the pattern of forest fires is determined by weather, topographic conditions, and fluctuation in moisture content. Therefore, when fire breaks out in pine tree forests during the dry season (January to March), it is difficult to extinguish, and it quickly spreads. In this study, the combustion characteristics of pine needles, pine cones, and pine branches in the water tube sections of living pine trees were compared and analyzed in accordance with the moisture content as per the ISO 5660-1. The monthly moisture content was analyzed from January to March, and it was found to be the lowest in March, with 53.6% for pine needles, 51.9% for pine branches, and 10.9% for pine cones. In particular, pine cones were more vulnerable to fire as compared to pine needles and pine branches because their moisture content was more than five times lower than that of pine needles and branches. The ignition time, which affects the speed of flame propagation, was the most rapid in March, and the fastest ignition time was for pine cones, at 19 seconds, followed by 34 seconds for pine needles, and 256 seconds for pine branches. The pine branches were the last to be ignited due to the effect of density, according to the thickness and specific gravity of the specimen. The peak heat release rate, which is a measurable index of fire intensity, was analyzed for pine cones and found to be 184.28 kW/m² , while the mean effective heat of combustion was 19.79 MJ/kg, and the total heat release rate was 39.7 MJ/m² , and these values were higher than those of pine branches and pine needles. Thus, we determined that the flame propagation speed and fire intensity according to the moisture content can be used to evaluate the risk of fire to the water tube section of pine trees. It is suggested that because of the combustion characteristics of the pine cone in March, that is when the forest is most vulnerable to fires.

• Journal of Cadastre & Land InformatiX
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• v.47 no.2
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• pp.107-120
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• 2017

There are many wildfire risk indices worldwide, but objective comparisons between such various wildfire risk indices and surface dryness indices have not been conducted for the wildfire cases in Korea. This paper describes a sensitivity analysis on the wildfire risk indices and surface dryness indices for Korea using LDAPS(Local Analysis and Prediction System) meteorological dataset on a 1.5-km grid and MODIS(Moderate-resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer) satellite images on a 1-km grid. We analyzed the meteorology-based wildfire risk indices such as the Australian FFDI(forest fire danger index), the Canadian FFMC(fine fuel moisture code), the American HI(Haines index), and the academically presented MNI(modified Nesterov index). Also we examined the satellite-based surface dryness indices such as NDDI(normalized difference drought index) and TVDI(temperature vegetation dryness index). As a result of the comparisons between the six indices regarding 120 wildfire cases with the area damaged over 1ha during the period between January 2013 and May 2017, we found that the FFDI and FFMC showed a good predictability for most wildfire cases but the MNI and TVDI were not suitable for Korea. The NDDI can be used as a proxy parameter for wildfire risk because its average CDF(cumulative distribution function) scores were stably high irrespective of fire size. The indices tested in this paper should be carefully chosen and used in an integrated way so that they can contribute to wildfire forecasting in Korea.