Spatial-temporal distribution of wildfires and fire weather parameters from 2005 to 2018 in Ardabil, NW Iran

This paper describes the dynamics of wildfires in Ardabil province, NW Iran, for the period 2005-2018. The spatial-temporal distribution of fires in different municipalities as well as weather parameters during the fire seasons was considered. The results showed that a total of 1363 fires and burned areas of 8928 ha were found during the study period of 14 years. 788, 311, 255 and 9 wildfires for Class I (< 1 ha), Class II (1–10 ha), Class III (10-100 ha), and Class IV (> 100 ha) wildfires, respectively were occurred for the study period (Figure 2). There is a typical summer wildfire season corresponding to the semi-Mediterranean dry period in the study area, which experience periods of strong winds, high temperatures, and low atmospheric relative humidity. The wildfire season usually falls between June and September and is responsible for more than 90% of the burned area recorded over the study period.

Keywords:

Wildfires , Spatial-temporal distribution , Weather parameters