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Fire
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Fire Spread Modelling in Wildland Urban Interface: Approaches and Challenges
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Fire Spread Modelling in Wildland Urban Interface: Approaches and Challenges

A special issue of Fire (ISSN 2571-6255). This special issue belongs to the section "Fire Research at the Science–Policy–Practitioner Interface".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 August 2023) | Viewed by 7976

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Maryam Ghodrat

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
School of Engineering and Information Technology, University of New South Wales Canberra, Canberra, ACT 2610, Australia
Interests: computational heat transfer; computational fluid dynamics; wildland urban interface; fire management; environmental engineering modelling
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Sofiane Meradji

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
IMATH Laboratory, EA 2134, Toulon University, 83160 Toulon, France
Interests: wildfire modeling; theoretical turbulence; computational fluid dynamics; high-performance computing; data assimilation; deep learning
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Wildfires in wildland–urban interface communities have rapidly grown in occurrence and strength over the past few decades due to the growing pace of urbanization and landscape transformation.

Although the mechanisms of fire spread in WUIs have been identified, developing models that can predict fire spread in WUIs is expected to be more challenging, mainly due to the heterogeneity characteristic of fuel.

This Special Issue aims to cover the current state of WUI modeling and existing knowledge on exposure conditions caused by nearby wildland fuels, adjacent structures or other system-wide components.

Original research articles and reviews are welcome. Research areas may include (but are not limited to) the following:

  • Wildland urban interface (WUI);
  • CFD simulation, modeling;
  • Fuel flammability;
  • WUI vegetation;
  • Numerical combustion;
  • Fire behavior;
  • Wildfire risk assessment and management.

We look forward to receiving your contributions.

Dr. Maryam Ghodrat
Dr. Sofiane Meradji
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Fire is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Dr. Maryam Ghodrat
Dr. Sofiane Meradji
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Fire is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • fire modeling
  • fire spread
  • fire behavior
  • numerical modeling
  • CFD simulation
  • wildland&ndash
  • urban interface
  • combustion

Published Papers (4 papers)

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18 pages, 5324 KiB  
Article
Shoot Flammability Patterns in Native and Exotic Street Tree Species at the Wildland–Urban Interface of Eastern Australia
by Nicola K. Huber-Smith, Elisabeth S. Morley, Daniel W. Krix, Megan L. Murray, Jonathan K. Webb, Leigh J. Martin, Kieran Young, Christopher M. McLean, Matthew C. Hingee and Brad R. Murray
Fire 2023, 6(11), 440; https://doi.org/10.3390/fire6110440 - 17 Nov 2023
Viewed by 1487
Abstract
Street trees provide ecosystem services such as heat mitigation, improved community well-being, and biodiversity conservation. At the wildland–urban interface (WUI), high-flammability street trees also provide a conflicting ecosystem disservice, heightening risks of wildfire spread into urban areas. We addressed this service–disservice conflict by [...] Read more.
Street trees provide ecosystem services such as heat mitigation, improved community well-being, and biodiversity conservation. At the wildland–urban interface (WUI), high-flammability street trees also provide a conflicting ecosystem disservice, heightening risks of wildfire spread into urban areas. We addressed this service–disservice conflict by assessing shoot flammability patterns in 10 street tree species, to identify low-flammability species that can potentially mitigate wildfire risks at the WUI. We found significant differences among species in flammability attributes including time-to-flame (TTF), flame duration (FD), number of flaming events (nF), and flame temperature (FT), and identified low-flammability species for each attribute. Overall, species’ rankings from least to most flammable differed considerably across the four attributes. For example, native water gum (Tristaniopsis laurina) had the slowest TTF, but had the longest FD. Among nine shoot traits, we found that high leafing intensity was the most frequent trait correlated with flammability. In particular, high leafing intensity was significantly related to fast TTF and high FT. Lack of coordination among flammability attributes suggests that, in general, selection of low-flammability street tree species should consider how each flammability attribute differentially contributes to wildfire spread risk. Nonetheless, native Tuckeroo (Cupaniopsis anacardioides) emerged as a potential candidate for further exploration as a low-flammability street tree as it had comparatively long TTF, short FD, and low nF. We found no consistent evidence that exotic species were less flammable than native species, and suggest that native trees be the focus of further research to identify low-flammability street trees. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Fire Spread Modelling in Wildland Urban Interface: Approaches and Challenges)
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19 pages, 4203 KiB  
Article
Numerical Assessment of Safe Separation Distance in the Wildland–Urban Interfaces
by Jacky Fayad, Gilbert Accary, Frédéric Morandini, François-Joseph Chatelon, Lucile Rossi, Thierry Marcelli, Dominique Cancellieri, Valérie Cancellieri, Yassine Rahib, Dominique Morvan, Sofiane Meradji, Antoine Pieri, Jean-Yves Duret and Jean-Louis Rossi
Fire 2023, 6(5), 209; https://doi.org/10.3390/fire6050209 - 18 May 2023
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1636
Abstract
A safe separation distance (SSD) needs to be considered during firefighting activities (fire suppression or people evacuation) against wildfires. The SSD is of critical interest for both humans and assets located in the wildland–urban interfaces (WUI). In most cases, the safety zone models [...] Read more.
A safe separation distance (SSD) needs to be considered during firefighting activities (fire suppression or people evacuation) against wildfires. The SSD is of critical interest for both humans and assets located in the wildland–urban interfaces (WUI). In most cases, the safety zone models and guidelines assume a flat terrain and only radiant heating. Nevertheless, injuries or damage do not result exclusively from radiant heating. Indeed, convection must be also considered as a significant contribution of heat transfer, particularly in the presence of the combined effects of sloping terrain and a high wind velocity. In this work, a critical case study is considered for the village of Sari-Solenzara in Corsica (France). This site location was selected by the operational staff since high-intensity fire spread is likely to occur in the WUI during wind-blown conditions. This study was carried out for 4 m high shrubland, a sloping terrain of 12° and a wind speed of 16.6 m/s. The numerical simulations were performed using a fully physical fire model, namely, FireStar2D, to investigate a case of fire spreading, which is thought to be representative of most high wildfire risk situations in Corsica. This study is based on the evaluation of the total (radiative and convective) heat flux received by two types of targets (human bodies and buildings) located ahead of the fire front. The results obtained revealed that the radiation was the dominant heat transfer mode in the evaluation of the SSD. In addition, the predictions were consistent with the criterion established by the operational experts, which assumes that in Corsica, a minimum SSD of 50 m is required to keep an equipped firefighter without injury in a fuelbreak named ZAL. This numerical work also provides correlations relating the total heat flux to the SSD. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Fire Spread Modelling in Wildland Urban Interface: Approaches and Challenges)
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25 pages, 5299 KiB  
Article
Collective Effects of Fire Intensity and Sloped Terrain on Wind-Driven Surface Fire and Its Impact on a Cubic Structure
by Maryam Ghodrat, Ali Edalati-Nejad and Albert Simeoni
Fire 2022, 5(6), 208; https://doi.org/10.3390/fire5060208 - 5 Dec 2022
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 1941
Abstract
The combined effects of percent slope and fire intensity of a wind driven line fire on an idealized building has been numerically investigated in this paper. The simulations were done using the large eddy simulation (LES) solver of an open source CFD toolbox [...] Read more.
The combined effects of percent slope and fire intensity of a wind driven line fire on an idealized building has been numerically investigated in this paper. The simulations were done using the large eddy simulation (LES) solver of an open source CFD toolbox called FireFOAM. A set of three fire intensity values representing different heat release rates of grassland fuels on different inclined fuel beds have been modeled to analyze the impact of factors, such as fuel and topography on wind-fire interaction of a built area. An idealized cubic structure representing a simplified building was considered downstream of the fire source. The numerical results have been verified with the aerodynamic measurements of a full-scale building model in the absence of fire effects. There is a fair consistency between the modeled findings and empirical outcomes with maximum error of 18%, which acknowledge the validity and precision of the proposed model. The results show that concurrent increase of fire intensity and terrain slope causes an expansion of the surface temperature of the building which is partially due to the increase of flame tilt angle upslope on the hilly terrains. In addition, increasing fire intensity leads to an increase in the flow velocity, which is associated with the low-pressure area observed behind the fire front. Despite limitations of the experimental results in the area of wind-fire interaction the result of the present work is an attempt to shed light on this very important problem of fire behavior prediction. This article is a primary report on this subject in CFD modeling of the collective effects of fire intensity and sloped terrain on wind driven wildfire and its interaction on buildings. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Fire Spread Modelling in Wildland Urban Interface: Approaches and Challenges)
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26 pages, 1721 KiB  
Systematic Review
Wildland–Urban Interface: Definition and Physical Fire Risk Mitigation Measures, a Systematic Review
by Flavio Taccaliti, Raffaella Marzano, Tina L. Bell and Emanuele Lingua
Fire 2023, 6(9), 343; https://doi.org/10.3390/fire6090343 - 1 Sep 2023
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 2159
Abstract
Due to the associated fire risk, the wildland–urban interface (WUI) has drawn the attention of researchers and managers from a range of backgrounds. From a land management point of view, it is important to identify the WUI to determine areas to prioritise for [...] Read more.
Due to the associated fire risk, the wildland–urban interface (WUI) has drawn the attention of researchers and managers from a range of backgrounds. From a land management point of view, it is important to identify the WUI to determine areas to prioritise for fire risk prevention. It is also important to know the fire risk mitigation measures available to select the most appropriate for each specific context. In this systematic review, definitions of the WUI were investigated and physical mitigation measures for reducing the risk of fire were examined from a land management perspective. The PRISMA 2020 Statement was applied to records published until 31 December 2022 and retrieved from the Web of Science, Scopus, and other research engines. A total of 162 publications from scientific journals and the grey literature were scrutinised and selected for analysis. Only publications providing an original definition of the WUI or proposing physical measures to reduce fire risk at the interface were retained, while those relating to emergency management and social perception were not considered. The risk of bias was reduced by internal cross-assessment by the research team. Definitions of the WUI (n = 40 publications) changed according to the research objective, varying broadly in identification of the anthropogenic and the wildland components of the interface. Terminology varied according to the definition, and the term wildland–human interface (WHI) was found to be more comprehensive than WUI. Methodological definitions of the interface ranged from using aggregated data through to identification of the buildings at risk in the interface with considerable precision. Five categories of physical fire risk mitigation measures (n = 128 publications) were identified: clearance distances, landscaping, wildland fuel management, land planning, and buildings design and materials. The most effective measures were those applied at early stages of urban development, and maintenance of assets and vegetation is crucial for preparedness. This review represents an analysis of scientific evidence on which land managers can base their actions to reduce the fire hazard risk in the WUI. The number of studies investigating the WUI is considerable, but experimental studies and quantitative results are scarce, and better communication and coordination among research groups and land management agencies is advisable. This systematic review was not registered. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Fire Spread Modelling in Wildland Urban Interface: Approaches and Challenges)
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