Fire Perimeter - Background
As part of the California Fire Plan
, the Fire and Resource Assessment Program compiled fire perimeter maps and established an on-going fire perimeter data capture process in order to update vegetative fuel rank maps . In an interagency effort FRAP compiled CDF fires 300 acres and greater in size and USFS fires 10 acres and greater into a statewide spatial database. Data attributes maintained in this layer include the date and name of the incident, lead agency, the incident number for linking to other fire related databases, cause and fire size. The process will integrate additional fire perimeter databases from Bureau of Land Management and the National Park Service as they become available.FRAP will produce an annual statewide fire perimeter GIS data layer by combining digitized fire perimeters from CDF and USFS. The long-range goal for maintenance of fire perimeter data will decentralize the data capture process to the individual fire station level. Immediately following a fire event local fire station personnel will map fires into the database. This process will be facilitated by a user friendly computer application that connects the local field user to a client-server database in Sacramento. CDF implemented a similar process, Emergency Activity Reporting System (EARS), for non-spatial data in 1989.
The fire perimeter database developed by CDF and USFS represents the most complete digital record of fire perimeters in California. However it is still incomplete in many respects. Users of the fire perimeter database must exercise caution to avoid inaccurate or erroneous conclusions. For more information on potential errors and their source please review the techniques section of these pages.