Western US MTBS-Interagency (WUMI) wildfire dataset
Data files
Feb 24, 2022 version files 48.38 MB
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burnarea_1984_2019.nc
41.57 MB
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forest_type_frac.nc
3.96 MB
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README.txt
3.11 KB
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west_US_fires_1984_2019.txt
2.85 MB
Aug 01, 2024 version files 50.71 MB
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burnarea_1984-2020_WUMI2.nc
43.12 MB
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forest_type_frac.nc
3.96 MB
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README.md
23.20 KB
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west_US_fires_1984-2020_WUMI2.txt
3.61 MB
Abstract
Area burned is an important variable for measuring wildfire activity. In the western United States (US), the timing and magnitude of area burned can be associated with meteorological and human activity to find the drivers of wildfire activity, but this type of research is dependent on the spatial and temporal resolution of available wildfire datasets. The Western US MTBS-Interagency (WUMI2) database is a dataset of wildfire events in the western United States (US) larger than 1 km2 for 1984 to 2020. WUMI2 includes the important Monitoring Trends in Burned Severity (MTBS) project (Eidenshink et al., 2007)—a Landsat satellite-based dataset of large fires (>4.04 km2)—and adds small (>1 to 4.04 km2) and large fires from government agency databases, including from the Fire Program Analysis (FPA) fire-occurrence database (Short et al., 2022). We performed extensive quality control to merge the datasets together and remove errors. The result is a western US-wide dataset with accurate fire frequency, timing, and area burned that can be used for analyses and modeling of wildfire activity. The current version of this data is WUMI2. The first iteration of the dataset (WUMI1) was published and described in Juang et al. (2022).
Dataset: Western US MTBS-Interagency (WUMI) Wildfire database
Version: WUMI2
Authors: Caroline S. Juang, A. Park Williams
Format: TXT
Last updated: 08/01/2024
DOI: https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.sf7m0cg72
Description of the data
Our WUMI2 fire database consists of 21,693 western US fire events from 1984 through 2020. A text file (west_US_fires_1984-2020_WUMI2.txt) provides a list of each fire event, including the fire’s name, discovery date, point location, total area burned, and forested area burned (see the corresponding** readme.txt file for column labels). We also include NetCDF files of the 1-km map of forest fractional coverage (forest_type_frac.nc) and the 1-km maps of monthly burned area over 1984–2020 (burnarea_1984-2020_WUMI2.nc).** Fires included in this database are from the Monitoring Trends in Burned Severity Product (MTBS) (Eidenshink et al., 2007), the Fire Program Analysis fire-occurrence database (FPA FOD 6th edition) of interagency fires (Short, 2022), and interagency fires from local databases (CalFire, ST/C&L, TRIBE), and interagency fires from government agency databases (BIA, BLM, BOR, DOD, DOE, NPS, FWS, FS, NPS). More information on methodology can be found in the Supporting Information in Juang et al. (2022). In addition to this methodology, the Fire Program Analysis fire-occurrence database (FPA FOD 6th edition) (Short, 2022) replaces our WUMI1 (Juang et al. (2022)) methodology for the government interagency fires from 1992-2020 for version WUMI2. As in WUMI1, we performed extensive quality control across all included datasets to remove errors in the various wildfire databases and merge the datasets together.
How to read this dataset
Columns labeled “intagncy” store information from six federal government agencies: BIA=Bureau of Indian Affairs, BLM=Bureau of Land Management, BOR=Bureau of Reclamation, DOD=Department of Defense, DOE=Department of Energy, FS=Forest Service, FWS=Fish and Wildlife Service, IA=Interagency Organization, NPS=National Park Service; and from state or local databases: CalFire=California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, ST&L=State, County, or Local Organization, and TRIBE=Tribal Organization. Collectively, these are referred to as interagency databases.
Columns labeled “MTBS” store information from the Monitoring Trends in Burn Severity (MTBS) database.
Columns labeled “final” are the data used in our investigations. The final fire name, location, and size used in our main investigation were decided on by order of priority (MTBS, CalFire, and then interagency databases), and included in the WUMI fire database labeled “final”. Each row in the database is for one fire event, which contains information about the fire as listed in the interagency databases, the associated information from the MTBS database for the same fire, and the final information that was used for analysis.
Sharing/Access information
Citing this dataset:
- Juang, C. S., Williams, A. P., Abatzoglou, J. T., Balch, J. K., Hurteau, M. D., & Moritz, M. A. (2022). Rapid growth of large forest fires drives the exponential response of annual forest-fire area to aridity in the western United States. Geophysical Research Letters, 49, e2021GL097131. https://doi.org/10.1029/2021GL097131
- Eidenshink, J., Schwind, B., Brewer, K., Zhu, Z. L., Quayle, B., & Howard, S. (2007). A project for monitoring trends in burn severity. Fire ecology, 3, 3-21. https://doi.org/10.4996/fireecology.0301003
- Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6
Data was derived from the following sources:
- The Monitoring Trends in Burn Severity (MTBS) 1984-2020 database can be obtained at https://www.mtbs.gov/direct-download (accessed 7 April 2023).
- Interagency fires from CalFire 1984-2020 can be obtained at the website for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (CalFire) https://frap.fire.ca.gov/frap-projects/fire-perimeters/ (accessed 16 November 2022).
- Interagency fires from BIA, BLM, BOR, DOD, DOE, FWS, FS, NPS, ST/C&L, and TRIBE 1992-2020 can be obtained from the Short (2022) database of United States wildfires 1992-2020 at the USFS Research Data Archive (https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6; accessed 5 May 2022).
- Interagency fires from BIA, BLM, BOR, FWS, FS, and NPS 1984-1991 can be obtained from the National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC) Wildland Fire Application Information Portal (https://www.wildfire.gov/page/zip-files; accessed 20 October 2021).
Column headers in the WUMI wildfire database
| Column Name | Type and units | Description |
|---|---|---|
| intagncy_agency | Text | Agency abbreviation for the database entry used, following the National Wildfire Coordinating Group (NWCG) Unit Identifier for the agency preparing the fire report. BIA=Bureau of Indian Affairs, BLM=Bureau of Land Management, BOR=Bureau of Reclamation, DOD=Department of Defense, DOE=Department of Energy, FS=Forest Service, FWS=Fish and Wildlife Service, IA=Interagency Organization, NPS=National Park Service; and from state or local databases: CalFire=California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, ST\&L=State, County, or Local Organization, and TRIBE=Tribal Organization. |
| intagncy_name | Text | Fire name as listed in the interagency database(s) |
| intagncy_year | Numeric, 4 digits | Fire discovery date, year |
| intagncy_month | Numeric, 1 to 12 | Fire discovery date, month |
| intagncy_day | Numeric, 1 to 31 | Fire discovery date, day |
| intagncy_lon | Numeric, decimal degrees (-180 to 180 °E) | Location of the fire center provided by the agency, longitude |
| intagncy_lat | Numeric, decimal degrees (-90 to 90 °N) | Location of the fire center provided by the agency, latitude |
| intagncy_area_ha | Numeric, in hectares (ha) | Fire size |
| intagncy_forest_area_ha | Numeric, in ha | Forested area fire size |
| MTBS_name | Text | Fire name as listed in the MTBS database |
| MTBS_year | Numeric, 4 digits | Fire discovery date, year |
| MTBS_month | Numeric, 1 to 12 | Fire discovery date, month |
| MTBS_day | Numeric, 1 to 31 | Fire discovery date, day |
| MTBS_lon | Numeric, decimal degrees (-180 to 180 °E) | Location of the fire center from MTBS polygon, longitude |
| MTBS_lat | Numeric, decimal degrees (-90 to 90 °N) | Location of the fire center from MTBS polygon, latitude |
| MTBS_area_ha | Numeric, in ha | Fire size |
| MTBS_forest_area_ha | Numeric, in hectares (ha) | Forested area fire size |
| MTBS_filename | String of letters and numbers | Unique fire ID in the MTBS database |
| final_year | Numeric, 4 digits | Combined WUMI database fire discovery date, year |
| final_month | Numeric, 1 to 12 | Combined WUMI database fire discovery date, month |
| final_day | Numeric, 1 to 31 | Combined WUMI database fire discovery date, day |
| final_lon | Numeric, decimal degrees (-180 to 180 °E) | Combined WUMI database location of the fire center, longitude |
| final_lat | Numeric, decimal degrees (-90 to 90 °N) | Combined WUMI database location of the fire center, latitude |
| final_area_ha | Numeric, in ha | Combined WUMI database fire size |
| final_forest_area_ha | Numeric, in ha | Combined WUMI database forested area fire size |
Version WUMI2
Updated August 1, 2024: Our WUMI2 fire database consists of 21,693 western US fire events from 1984 through 2020. A text file (west_US_fires_1984-2020_WUMI2.txt) provides a list of each fire event, including the fire’s name, discovery date, point location, total area burned, and forested area burned (see the corresponding readme.txt file for column labels). We also include NetCDF files of the 1-km map of forest fractional coverage (forest_type_frac.nc) and the 1-km maps of monthly burned area over 1984–2020 (burnarea_1984-2020_WUMI2.nc). Fires included in this database are from the Monitoring Trends in Burned Severity Product (MTBS) (Eidenshink et al., 2007), the Fire Program Analysis fire-occurrence database (FPA FOD 6th edition) of interagency fires (Short, 2022), and interagency fires from local databases (CalFire, ST/C&L, TRIBE), and interagency fires from government agency databases (BIA, BLM, BOR, DOD, DOE, NPS, FWS, FS, NPS). More information on methodology can be found in the Supporting Information in Juang et al. (2022). In addition to this methodology, the Fire Program Analysis fire-occurrence database (FPA FOD 6th edition) (Short, 2022) replaces our WUMI1 (Juang et al. (2022)) methodology for the government interagency fires from 1992-2020 for version WUMI2. As in WUMI1, we performed extensive quality control across all included datasets to remove errors in the various wildfire databases and merge the datasets together.
Version WUMI1 (older)
Updated August 16, 2021: Our WUMI1 fire database consists of 18,368 western US fire events from 1984 through 2019. A text file (west_US_fires_1984_2019.txt) provides a list of each fire event, including the fire’s name, discovery date, point location, total area burned, and forested area burned (see the corresponding readme.txt file for column labels). We also include NetCDF files of the 1-km map of forest fractional coverage (forest_type_frac.nc) and the 1-km maps of monthly burned area over 1984–2019 (burnarea_1984_2019.nc). Fires included in this database from the Monitoring Trends in Burned Severity Product (MTBS), fires from a state database (CalFire), fires from government interagency databases (BIA, BLM, BOR, NPS, FWS, FS). More information on methodology can be found in the Supporting Information in Juang et al. (2022).
The name of this version of the database is WUMI2.
When using this database, please cite the following databases:
Juang, C. S., Williams, A. P., Abatzoglou, J. T., Balch, J. K., Hurteau, M. D., & Moritz, M. A. (2022). Rapid growth of large forest fires drives the exponential response of annual forest-fire area to aridity in the western United States. Geophysical Research Letters, 49, e2021GL097131. https://doi.org/10.1029/2021GL097131.
Eidenshink, J., Schwind, B., Brewer, K., Zhu, Z. L., Quayle, B., & Howard, S. (2007). A project for monitoring trends in burn severity. Fire ecology, 3, 3-21. https://doi.org/10.4996/fireecology.0301003
Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6