Experimental Products
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Current Conditions
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Forecast Conditions
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Image Archive
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Data Archive
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Gridded NFDRS Forecast
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Unavailable
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Note: 21-October, 2004.
This product will be temporarily unavailable due to a change in NWS
servers.
The Gridded NFDRS project is a cooperative effort between
the
Fire Behavior Research Work Unit at the Missoula Fire Sciences Lab
and the Missoula Forecast Office of the National Weather Service.
The objective of the project is development of a proof-of-concept
product that integrates operational NCEP forecast models into a
Fire Danger Environment.
The gridded NFDRS forecast product uses the 29-km ETA model as a
basis for the 'next day' fire danger forecast using 21Z (3 p.m.
MDT) as the validation time. The 21Z temperature, relative
humidity, percent cloud cover, state of the weather, and wind speed
are noted. The 3-hour increments of the ETA forecast are examined
to estimate the forecasted maximum and minimum temperature and
humidity and total precipitation duration from 21Z to 21Z. The
29-km grid values are interpolated to a 1-km grid using
high-resolution elevation data and an objective interpolation
scheme (Tim Barker, NWS, Boise).
The forecast grids are passed
to the Missoula Fire Sciences Lab
where they are integrated with the 1-km NFDRS fuel model map,
current NDVI greenness information (to estimate live fuel
moisture), and observed field values of the heavy (100-h and
1000-h) fuel moistures and KBDI (via WFAS maps). The NFDRS
algorithms are applied to the 1-km mix of fuel model, slope,
forecast weather and observed heavy fuel moistures to generate a
next-day forecast of the NFDRS indexes and components.
In Fall of 2001, ERC and BI maps based on a single fuel
model
across the country (NFDRS Model G) were added.