Fire Weather Index (FWI) for Estonia for growing seasons 2018 and 2019

Abstract

The Canadian Forest Fire Weather Index (FWI) System (Van Wagner 1987) is a weather-based means of calculating potential fire conditions. Canadian research on forest fire danger rating was started in the 1920s, but in recent decades, FWI is widely used in Europe. The FWI System depends solely on weather measurements taken each day at noon local time. Daily inputs to the system consist of temperature (°C), relative humidity (%), wind speed (km/h), and precipitation (mm) over the past 24 hours. The FWI System outputs three moisture codes: the Fine Fuel Moisture Code (FFMC), the Duff Moisture Code (DMC), and the Drought Code (DC), with higher values indicating drier conditions and greater fire danger. The FWI System also generates three fire behavior outputs based on the above indices: the Initial Spread Index (ISI), the Build-Up Index (BUI), and the Fire Weather Index (FWI), with higher values indicating elevated fire danger (Van Wagner 1987). This dataset creation was a part of RITA1/02-52 "Use of remote sensing data for elaboration and development of public services (1.01.2019−31.12.2020)" and its work-package “Prevention and suppression of wildfires“. Project adopted Canadian methodology and investigated possibility of FWI in Estonian meteorological service for wild fire prevention routings.

C. E. Van Wagner (1987). Development and Structure of the Canadian Forest Fire Weather Index System. Canadian forest service, Forestery Technical report 35, Ottawa