IS IT POSSIBLE TO MAP WILDFIRE SUSCEPTIBILITY IN MADEIRA ISLAND?

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DOI:

https://doi.org/10.21138/GF.692

Abstract

As climate change accelerates, the severity of forest fires increases and is particularly severe on small islands. This study focuses on wildfire susceptibility mapping in Madeira Island (Autonomous Region of Madeira, Portugal). Through a sensitive analysis of the predisposing factors, the possibility of mapping the susceptibility to wildfires on the island of Madeira is performed. For this analysis the burnt areas from 2006 to 2013 were related with some widely used variables in wildfire susceptibility modelling, namely land use, elevation, slopes, precipitation, humidity and temperature. The overall performance achieved by the information value method was assessed through success rate curves. The susceptibility models obtained with different combinations of variables present a very similar and unsatisfactory explanatory capacity. The different variable combination provided by the analysis demonstrated that land use and elevation play a major role in wildfire susceptibility explanatory capacity in Madeira Island.

Author Biographies

Nelson Mileu, Universidade de Lisboa

Instituto de Geografia e Ordenamento do Território

Bernardo Sargento, Universidade de Lisboa

Instituto de Geografia e Ordenamento do Território

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Published

2021-12-31

How to Cite

Mileu, N., & Sargento, B. (2021). IS IT POSSIBLE TO MAP WILDFIRE SUSCEPTIBILITY IN MADEIRA ISLAND?. GeoFocus. International Review of Geographical Information Science and Technology, (28), 5–23. https://doi.org/10.21138/GF.692

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Artículos