V International Conference on Forest Fire Research

D. X. Viegas (Ed.), 2006

Estimation of Lightning-caused fires occurrence probability in

Central Spain

Héctor Nieto
Department of Geography, University of Alcalá. Calle Colegios 2, Alcalá de Henares,
Madrid 28801, Spain., hector.nieto@uah.es
Inmaculada Aguado
Department of Geography, University of Alcalá. Calle Colegios 2, Alcalá de Henares,
Madrid 28801, Spain, inmaculada.aguado@uah.es
Emilio Chuvieco
Department of Geography, University of Alcalá. Calle Colegios 2, Alcalá de Henares,
Madrid 28801, Spain, emilio.chuvieco@uah.es

Abstract: Lightning is the main natural cause of forest fires in the Iberian Peninsula. Although
only 4% of forest fires in Spain are caused by strokes, lightning fires often occur in remote areas
and therefore, frequently are responsible of large wildfires.
Lightning behaviour has been widely analysed by several works which have emphasised the
relationships of these events with topography, weather and population density. As opposite,
patterns of occurrence of lightning-caused wildfires is less known in the Iberian Peninsula, due to
its relative low importance with human caused wildfires.
This study is part of a forest fire risk assessment index developed within the FIREMAP Project
(funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science). Data from two different regions in Spain are used:
Madrid and Teruel, both located in Central Spain. The former is a region with a low number of
lightning-caused fires (less than 4% of total wildfires investigated) whereas the later has a high
occurrence of these wildfires (over 50 % of the total). The period of the study comprises the
months of May to September (the most fire-prone in Spain) in a three years interval (2002-2004).
In this study we first examine spatio-temporal relationships between lightning-ignited fires and
topography, vegetation and weather patterns. We will also make use of fire danger meteorological
indices from the Canadian Fire Weather Index and the USA, National Fire Danger Rating System,
in order to analyse patterns of occurrence based on dead fuel moisture content.
We have developed a statistical model based on logistic regression to estimate the probability of
having a lightning-caused forest fire in a 3x3km grid along the 2002-2004 period. The most
significant variable found is the number of dry storms (defined as a thunderstorm having a
precipitation of less than 4mm). The results show a spatial distribution according with orography,
and with historical fire records.

Keywords: lightning, ignition probability, fire occurrence

1. Introduction

Assessing fire risk is one of the most important issues for management in
Mediterranean ecosystems. Although occurrence of lightning-caused wildfires in Iberian
Peninsula is low (near 4% of reported fires in Spain) they burn larger woodland surfaces
than other causes. It is so because they usually occur in remote forest areas, where the
detection and attack takes more time (Wotton et al., 2005a). Moreover, the meteorological
conditions under thunderstorms, with more activity from dawn and strong winds, make
difficult the use aerial extinction resources (Vélez, 2000). Indeed, the 4% of lightning-

1
 V International Conference on Forest Fire Research
D. X. Viegas (Ed.), 2006

caused fires in Spain during de 1990-2004 period burned the 10% of the total burned
surface during this period.
Lightning occurrence is strongly related with orography (Dissing et al., 2003; Rivas
Soriano et al., 2005). Most of the thunderstorm occur from May to September, due to the
annual cycle of temperatures, (Rivas Soriano et al., 2005). Therefore, several studies in
order to estimate the probability of ignition, have used several variables related with
topography as altitude, slope, aspect (Díaz-Avalos et al., 2001; Wierzchowski et al., 2002;
Podur, 2003). On the other hand, McRae (1992) only finds a positive relation on saddle
points.
The requirement for a lighting to cause the ignition is to have a long enough current
to increase the temperature of the fuel (Kourtz et al., 1991; Latham et al., 2001). Most of
the positive lightning have this long continuum current (Latham e t al., 2001) so several
studies have taken into account the proportion of positive lightning in order to estimate the
probability of ignition (Kourtz et al., 1991; Latham et al., 2001; Anderson, 2002; Wotton et
al., 2005a). However, in Finland Larjavaara et al. (2005) found no relation between polarity
and probability of ignition.
Another key factor in fire occurrence is meteorology and fuel moisture content
(Kourtz et al., 1991; Rorig et al., 1999; Díaz-Avalos et al., 2001; Rorig et al., 2002;
Álvarez Lamata, 2005). The usual way of measuring fuel moisture content is by the use of
fire weather indices (Nash et al., 1996; Wierzchowski et al., 2002; Podur, 2003; Wotton et
al., 2005a). Related also with fuels, vegetation cover, plays a double role in lightning-
caused wildfires, first, there are some covers with more lightning prone (Dissing et al.,
2003). Second, differences in duff layer, produced by differences in vegetation type, may
result in different rates of heating and therefore differences in flammability (Latham et al.,
2001).

2. Objective

In order to supply forest managers a tool for decision support in long-term

prevention the objective is to analyse spatial and temporal patterns of lightning-caused
forest fires. The final objective of this work is to elaborate a long-term probability map of
lightning-caused fires for the 2002-2004 period, with a 3x3km grid resolution.

3. Material and Methods

Study areas
Two different regions have been analysed, the Autonomous Community of Madrid
and the Province of Teruel.
The Autonomous Community of Madrid has a forest surface of around 4340 km2 ,
that results the 54% of the total surface of the region. The majority of forest surface in the
region is concentrated around the Central Mountainous System. Forests in Madrid are
mainly composed by Pinus sylvestris L. and Quercus pyrenaica Willd. over the
mountainous zones, and by Quercus ilex L. subsp. ballota (Desf.) in lower altitude zones.
Madrid is the densest populated region of Spain, and the majority of forest fires are human
caused, due to a very important urban-forest interface. Therefore, there is a low incidence
of lighting-caused fires (near of 2% during the 1990-2004 period).

2
 V International Conference on Forest Fire Research
D. X. Viegas (Ed.), 2006

The province of Teruel is one of

the three provinces of the Autonomous
Community of Aragón. It has a forest
extension of 10140 km2 , being the 70%
of the total surface of the region. Most of
the forested areas are located around the
Iberian Montanious System, whereas the
lowest zones are mostly dominated by
cultures. Teruel is sparsely dense
populated and lightning is the main
cause of forest fires(more than 50% of
fires reported between 1990-2004).
Figure 1. Geographical situation of both regions of Thunderstorms in Teruel are very
the study frequent, with a very high convective
activity in summer caused mainly by the
influence of Mediterranean Sea, which contributes with hot moist air masses (Rivas
Soriano et al., 2005). The main tree species present in Teruel are Pinus sylvestris L., Pinus
nigra Arn. and Quercus ilex L. subsp. ballota (Desf.)
The period of the study comprises the months of May to September (the most fire-
prone in Spain) in a three years interval (2002-2004).

Data
Lightning location data is provided by the National Meteorological Institute (INM)
of Spain. This database has information about lightning estimated coordinates, intensity,
polarity and quality of location estimation. He have filtered the locations with best
accuracy, using only the flashes with a χ2 equal or smaller than 2 as described in Martín
León (1996) and a long semi axis radius of the error ellipse equal or smaller than 1.5 km.
The ignition locations of forest fires are derived from forest fire database generated
by the Environmental Ministry of Spain, and is derived from fire field reports written by
forestry personnel. This database provides, among others, information about detection time,
ignition location and estimated cause of ignition. Most part of fire registries are not coded
with the exact location of ignition in term of coordinates, whereas these locations are coded
in terms of 1) Municipality and 2) 10x10 km UTM grid. Therefore, in order to reduce the
spatial uncertainty of ignitions we have crossed these two fields.
The source of the digital terrain model used is the National Cartographic Database,
with a pixel resolution of 250 m. From
Table 1. Reclassification of Spanish Forest Map this DTM, we have derived the slope,
Code Vegetation cover curvature (computed as the second
1 Conifer Woodlands derivate of height field) and aspect, and
2 Deciduous Broadleaf Woodlands
3 Conifers and Broadleaf mixed Woodlands assigned this data to each lightning
4 Evergreen Broadleaf Woodlands location.
5 Broadleaf mixed Woodlands
6 Open Woodlands The Spanish Forest Map has
7 Gallery Woodlands been produced with a scale 1:50000 and
8 Shrublands
9 Grasslands provides overstory and understory
10 Mosaic Composed of Woodlands and Others information about composition and
11 Forest Plantations
12 Reforestations structure. We have summarized all this
13 Deforested Areas information in a few main vegetation
classes, showed in Table 1

3
 V International Conference on Forest Fire Research
D. X. Viegas (Ed.), 2006

Daily meteorological data has been provided by Meteologica S.A. The data consists
on daily observations of temperature, relative humidity, rainfall and wind speed,
interpolated in a 3x3 km grid. From this data, we have computed the dead fuel moisture
content models that are included in the USA, National Fire Danger Rating System: 1-h and
10- h timelags (Bradshaw et al., 1983) and the codes provided by the Canadian Forest Fire
Weather Index: FFMC, DMC and DC. (Van Wagner, 1987). Both the CFFWI and the
NFDRS contain several components and have been validated for fire prevention purposes
in several Mediterranean contexts (Rodríguez y Silva, 2002; Sebastián et al., 2002).
The 1-h and 10-h index, estimates water content in fuels with a width of less than
0,64 cm and 1.2 to 2.5 cm diameter respectively (Bradshaw et al., 1983) and uses the
concept of Equilibrium Moisture Content (EMC). The EMC of a fuel particle under given
environmental conditions is the moisture content that the particle will attain if left for
sufficient time in those constant conditions. EMC is a function of the temperature and the
relative humidity (Simard, 1968), as well as the atmospheric conditions present at the time
the samples are measured.
The Canadian Forest Fire Weather Index (FWI) incorporates extensive laboratory
and field tests carried out in Canada during several years. The FWI is a measure of the fire
danger due to meteorological conditions. The input parameters are daily values (at 12:00 h)
of wind speed, air temperature, relative humidity and 24 h precipitation, as well as
cumulative values from previous days. Intermediate outputs are the moisture values of fine
fuels (FFMC), of the duff layer (DMC) and of the medium to heavy fuels (DC)

Methods
In a first approach we have analysed the patterns of occurrence from a spatial and a
temporal point of view. From a spatial point of view, we will search relationships between
the occurrence of a lightning wildfire inside the intersections of Municipality and 10x10
UTM grid, and next independent variables.
P100_Forest: Percentage of forest surface in a Municipality-10 x 10 UTM grid.
Flash_ha: Total number of flashes rationed with forest hectares in a Municipality-
10 x 10 UTM grid.
Pos_ha: Total number of positive flashes rationed with forest hectares in a
Municipality-10 x 10 UTM grid.
Mean_Int: Mean intensity of flashes in a Municipality-10 x 10 UTM grid.
Altitude: Mean altitude of flashes in a Municipality-10 x 10 UTM grid.
Slope: Mean slope of flashes in a Municipality-10 x 10 UTM grid.
Curvature: Mean curvature of flashes in a Municipality-10 x 10 UTM grid.
P100_Aspect0: Percentage of flashes in flat terrain in a Municipality-10 x 10 UTM
grid.
P100_AspectN: Percentage of flashes north exposed in a Municipality-10 x 10
UTM grid.
P100_AspectNE: Percentage of flashes northeast exposed in a Municipality-10 x 10
UTM grid.
P100_AspectE: Percentage of flashes east exposed in a Municipality-10 x 10 UTM
grid.
P100_AspectSE: Percentage of flashes southheast exposed in a Municipality-10 x
10 UTM grid.
P100_AspectS: Percentage of flashes south exposed in a Municipality-10 x 10
UTM grid.

4
 V International Conference on Forest Fire Research
D. X. Viegas (Ed.), 2006

P100_AspectSW: Percentage of flashes southwest exposed in a Municipality-10 x

10 UTM grid.
P100_AspectW: Percentage of flashes west exposed in a Municipality-10 x 10
UTM grid.
P100_AspectNW: Percentage of flashes northwest exposed in a Municipality-10 x
10 UTM grid.
P100_Fx: Percentage of flashes in vegetation cover “x” in a Municipality-10 x 10
UTM grid.

As these variables are no time dependent, we have defined them as structural

variables.
The great number of null responses of ignitions over the Municipalities-10 x 10
UTM grid recommends non parametric test, thus we will test for differences in locations
using U-Mann-Whitney tests. (Dolling et al., 2005)
Table 2. Descriptive statistics of spatial variables. Autonomous Community of Madrid.
N Min Max Mean Std.Dev.
FIRE (0/1) 390 0 1 0.04 0.193
P100_Forest 390 0.98 100.00 63.6458 30.89847
Flash_ha 390 .00 .43 0.0202 0.02827
Pos_ha 390 .00 .03 0.0008 0.00233
Mean_Int 390 -57.68 73.40 -16.5066 10.41754
Altitude 390 460.00 2084.62 926.5111 344.38767
Slope 390 .00 43.18 7.3129 7.59245
Curvature 390 -0.07 0.12 0.0059 .01840
P100_Aspect0 390 0 100 8.32 21.100
P100_AspectN 390 0 100 4.81 13.852
P100_AspectNE 390 0 100 6.37 15.556
P100_AspectE 390 0 100 12.07 20.794
P100_AspectSE 390 0 100 19.48 25.828
P100_AspectS 390 0 100 16.15 24.387
P100_AspectSW 390 0 100 11.50 19.877
P100_AspectW 390 0 100 11.50 22.525
P100_AspectNW 390 0 100 9.86 21.508
P100_F1 390 0 100 10.91 23.157
P100_F2 390 .00 100.00 7.1144 17.39003
P100_F3 390 0 100 1.96 8.600
P100_F4 390 .00 100.00 19.8966 31.09304
P100_F5 390 0 100 1.82 9.737
P100_F6 390 .00 100.00 3.8039 13.33656
P100_F7 390 .00 100.00 4.2365 15.64512
P100_F8 390 .00 100.00 33.1891 37.52291
P100_F9 390 .00 100.00 9.6522 21.16524
P100_F10 390 0 40 0.66 3.406
P100_F11 390 .00 100.00 4.9449 14.07976
P100_F12 390 0 90 0.68 6.214
P100_F13 390 0 8 0.02 .405

5
 V International Conference on Forest Fire Research
D. X. Viegas (Ed.), 2006

On the other hand, the temporal analysis is performed by computing, for each
thunderstorm in a Municipality-10 x 10 UTM grid, the occurrence of a wildfire as
dependent variable and next independent variables:
Table 3. Descriptive statistics of spatial variables. Province of Teruel.
N Min Max Mean Std.Dev.
FIRE (0/1) 823 0 1 0.10 .303
P100_Forest 823 1.08 100.00 65.1036 26.71747
Flash_ha 823 .01 1.00 0.1136 .07007
Pos_ha 823 .00 .03 0.0017 .00267
Mean_Int 823 -61.90 9.40 -15.6907 4.14189
Altitude 823 202.50 1898.00 1086.4839 358.85446
Slope 823 .00 42.42 7.0189 4.94262
Curvature 823 -.22 .08 0.0065 .01722
P100_Aspect0 823 0 100 4.66 11.571
P100_AspectN 823 0 100 7.87 12.828
P100_AspectNE 823 0 100 12.66 19.201
P100_AspectE 823 0 100 9.86 15.375
P100_AspectSE 823 0 100 6.69 12.302
P100_AspectS 823 0 100 6.15 10.916
P100_AspectSW 823 0 100 6.99 13.451
P100_AspectW 823 0 100 6.22 12.658
P100_AspectNW 823 0 100 5.97 11.333
P100_F1 823 .00 100.00 32.9735 35.82163
P100_F2 823 .00 79.31 1.8787 7.97967
P100_F3 823 .00 100.00 2.6466 8.87630
P100_F4 823 .00 100.00 7.5711 18.17431
P100_F5 823 0 100 0.99 6.386
P100_F6 823 0 10 0.03 .421
P100_F7 823 .00 100.00 .7547 5.87707
P100_F8 823 .00 100.00 30.5453 33.53075
P100_F9 823 .00 100.00 8.3010 18.40991
P100_F10 823 .00 100.00 7.9561 15.98315
P100_F11 823 0 33 0.09 1.279
P100_F12 823 .00 100.00 4.2682 11.56060
P100_F13 823 .00 100.00 1.9510 9.36534

Flash_ha_storm: Number of flashes per thunderstorm rationed with forest hectares

in a Municipality-10 x 10 UTM grid.
Pos_ha_storm: Number of positive flashes per thunderstorm rationed with forest
hectares in a Municipality-10 x 10 UTM grid.
Mean_int_storm: Mean intensity per thunderstorm in a Municipality-10 x 10 UTM
grid.
Min_24hRain: Minimum 24 hours accumulated rainfall in a Municipality-10 x 10
UTM grid per thunderstorm.
Mean_24hRain: Mean 24 hours accumulated rainfall in a Municipality-10 x 10
UTM grid per thunderstorm.

6
 V International Conference on Forest Fire Research
D. X. Viegas (Ed.), 2006

Max_FFMC: Maximum value of FFMC code in a Municipality-10 x 10 UTM grid

per thunderstorm.
Mean_FFMC: Mean value of FFMC code in a Municipality-10 x 10 UTM grid per
thunderstorm.
Table 4. Descriptive statistics of temporal variables. Autonomous Community of Madrid.
N Min Max Mean Std.Dev.
FIRE (0/1) 2001 .00 1.00 .0095 .09700
Flash_ha_storm 2001 .0001 .2609 .003929 .0101200
Pos_ha_storm 2001 .0000 .0333 .000156 .0010633
Mean_int_storm 2001 -176.00 197.70 -14.6900 20.71146
Mean_24hRain 2001 .00 45.60 4.7355 7.38764
Mean_FFMC 2001 25.17 94.73 72.3480 18.01870
Mean_DMC 2001 .35 411.63 65.5204 72.60820
Mean_DC 2001 3.26 939.47 371.0795 224.91695
Mean_1h 2001 .00 24.34 10.6275 3.41080
Mean_10h 2001 .00 30.25 13.2069 4.23847
Min_24hRain 2001 .00 45.60 4.3968 7.00724
Max_FFMC 2001 25.17 94.74 73.0419 17.89557
Max_DMC 2001 .35 411.63 67.2686 73.39738
Max_DC 2001 3.26 939.47 378.8938 226.90169
Min_1h 2001 .00 24.34 10.5077 3.55257
Min_10h 2001 .00 30.25 13.0581 4.41463

Table 5. Descriptive statistics of temporal variables. Province of Teruel

N Min Max Mean Std.Dev.
FIRE (0/1) 15249 .00 1.00 .0076 .08689
Flash_ha_storm 15247 .0001 1.0000 .006131 .0150584
Pos_ha_storm 15249 .0000 .0345 .000091 .0006221
Mean_int_storm 15249 -268.80 338.00 -14.1930 14.72818
Mean_24hRain 15249 .00 118.92 5.2744 9.17066
Mean_FFMC 15249 5.34 93.21 67.8677 17.10824
Mean_DMC 15249 .41 210.76 36.8584 28.75606
Mean_DC 15249 3.25 860.47 338.4753 170.56794
Mean_1h 15249 .00 28.23 12.6102 3.08860
Mean_10h 15249 .00 35.09 15.6709 3.83830
Min_24hRain 15249 .00 118.80 4.8415 8.82187
Max_FFMC 15249 7.59 93.21 68.9966 17.04949
Max_DMC 15249 .41 210.76 38.9030 30.13266
Max_DC 15249 3.25 878.87 346.8841 174.69793
Min_1h 15249 .00 28.23 12.4182 3.30496
Min_10h 15249 .00 35.09 15.4323 4.10718

Max_DMC: Maximum value of DMC code in a Municipality-10 x 10 UTM grid

per thunderstorm.
Mean_DMC: Mean value of DMC code in a Municipality-10 x 10 UTM grid per
thunderstorm.

7
 V International Conference on Forest Fire Research
D. X. Viegas (Ed.), 2006

Max_DC: Maximum value of DC code in a Municipality-10 x 10 UTM grid per

thunderstorm.
Mean_DC: Mean value of DC code in a Municipality-10 x 10 UTM grid per
thunderstorm.
Min_1hr: Minimum value of 1hr moisture in a Municipality-10 x 10 UTM grid per
thunderstorm.
Mean_1hr: Mean value of 1hr moisture in a Municipality-10 x 10 UTM grid per
thunderstorm.
Min_10hr: Minimum value of 1hr moisture in a Municipality-10 x 10 UTM grid
per thunderstorm.
Mean_10hr: Mean value of 1hr moisture in a Municipality-10 x 10 UTM grid per
thunderstorm.
As happened with the spatial analysis, we also performed U-Mann-Whitney tests
looking for differences in thunderstorms.
In order to reduce the spatial uncertainty of the ignitions we will assign, for each fire
reported in one Municipality-10 x 10 UTM grid, a supposed ignition cell among the 3x3km
meteorological grid. The criteria of selection are based on their daily meteorological
observations, following the results of previous temporal patterns analysed.
Finally, we will perform the training and validation of the probability of ignition
model. The statistical methodology to train the model will be logistic regression, using as
dependent variable the occurrence of one (or more) ignitions inside a 3x3 cell during the
2002-2004 time period. As independent variables we will take into account the most
significant variables previously analysed. For each structural variable, we will compute the
mean value of forest areas within each 3x3 grid. In order to transform the meteorological
variables into structural variables we will count the number of days in which the observed
values are above a defined threshold along the 2002-2004 observation data. These
thresholds applied on meteorological indices are computed as the average of the values in
thunderstorms which caused forest fires. They are computed in the two regions separately.
On the other hand we have counted the number of “dry storm” along the period as the
number of thunderstorms with an accumulated precipitation in 24 hours equal or less to
4mm. This threshold has been based on previous works (Rorig et al., 1999; Álvarez
Lamata, 2005).
We will train a model for Madrid and Teruel separately but we will also use both
datasets joint under the assumption that there is no difference of patters among these two
regions. In order to train and validate those models we will use a random set of cells of
60% of each of the three datasets for training set and the 40% remaining for validating the
models.

4. Results

Spatial patterns
The results from the U-Mann-Whitney test for each region and the joint dataset can
be seen in Table 6. Most of the variables have the same behaviour in both regions; in
particular, there is a significant relationship between lightning-ignited fires and mean
intensity of flashes, slope and presence of woodlands. The different behaviour of aspect-
derived variables in both regions can be due to different situations of mountainous systems
and different convective circulation along the two regions.

8
 V International Conference on Forest Fire Research
D. X. Viegas (Ed.), 2006

We can therefore deduce that lightning wildfires are related with orography and
woodland cover.
Table 6. U-Mann-Whitney results for spatial patterns. The variables that result significant are bolded.
Madrid Teruel Joint
U z Sig U z Sig U Z Sig
P100_Forest 2061.00 -1.76 0.079 29437.50 -0.78 0.438 50411.00 -1.42 0.156
Flash_ha 2310.00 -1.17 0.240 25147.00 -2.85 0.004 38786.50 -4.90 0.000
Pos_ha 2325.50 -1.31 0.191 23641.50 -3.71 0.000 38810.50 -5.19 0.000
Mean_Int 1966.00 -1.98 0.048 26953.00 -1.98 0.048 48285.50 -2.05 0.040
Altitude 1413.00 -3.27 0.001 26621.50 -2.14 0.032 54153.00 -0.30 0.767
Slope 1443.00 -3.20 0.001 21271.00 -4.73 0.000 35466.00 -5.89 0.000
Curvature 2329.00 -1.26 0.207 22508.00 -4.42 0.000 39895.00 -4.94 0.000
P100_Aspect0 2560.00 -0.78 0.434 30468.00 -0.31 0.756 53581.50 -0.55 0.585
P100_AspectN 2162.50 -1.98 0.048 24469.50 -3.29 0.001 39993.50 -4.87 0.000
P100_AspectNE 1854.00 -2.73 0.006 28627.00 -1.19 0.235 44015.50 -3.48 0.000
P100_AspectE 1490.00 -3.38 0.001 28657.00 -1.18 0.239 45914.00 -2.86 0.004
P100_AspectSE 1797.00 -2.48 0.013 23143.00 -3.97 0.000 42777.50 -3.85 0.000
P100_AspectS 2299.50 -1.28 0.201 23422.00 -3.83 0.000 43760.00 -3.56 0.000
P100_AspectSW 2301.50 -1.31 0.190 24959.00 -3.08 0.002 44637.50 -3.33 0.001
P100_AspectW 2390.00 -1.12 0.263 23040.50 -4.06 0.000 42272.00 -4.12 0.000
P100_AspectNW 2557.00 -0.71 0.475 23457.00 -3.84 0.000 42011.50 -4.23 0.000
P100_F1 1900.00 -2.60 0.009 24084.50 -3.45 0.001 37562.50 -5.55 0.000
P100_F2 1709.00 -3.37 0.001 29454.00 -1.22 0.221 50517.50 -2.04 0.041
P100_F3 2035.00 -3.34 0.001 23122.50 -5.31 0.000 39945.50 -6.75 0.000
P100_F4 2610.50 -0.53 0.595 25526.50 -3.17 0.002 49709.50 -1.89 0.058
P100_F5 2801.00 -0.06 0.950 28758.00 -2.47 0.014 51799.00 -2.26 0.024
P100_F6 2302.50 -1.90 0.058 30828.00 -0.76 0.450 54952.50 -0.15 0.884
P100_F7 2526.00 -1.08 0.280 27134.00 -3.74 0.000 49223.50 -3.25 0.001
P100_F8 2786.50 -0.06 0.950 30576.00 -0.23 0.821 54871.00 -0.08 0.934
P100_F9 1782.00 -3.00 0.003 26888.00 -2.29 0.022 45081.00 -3.51 0.000
P100_F10 2621.00 -1.07 0.283 19435.50 -6.19 0.000 32979.50 -8.03 0.000
P100_F11 1775.00 -3.42 0.001 30941.00 -0.23 0.821 53811.50 -0.86 0.388
P100_F12 2688.00 -1.12 0.264 24352.00 -3.99 0.000 42082.50 -5.47 0.000
P100_F13 2625.00 -5.00 0.000 27609.50 -2.55 0.011 47691.00 -4.03 0.000

Temporal patterns
The results from the U-Mann-Whitney test for each region and the joint dataset can
be seen in Table 7.
As we can see, all meteorological indices result significant in all datasets; we infer
therefore that dead fuel moisture content plays a fundamental role in lightning ignition. On
the other hand, rainfall seems not significant for the region of Madrid.
Comparing flash density between the spatial and temporal point of view (Tables 6
and 7, respectively) we can deduce that flash density in a thunderstorm is not related with
fire occurrence, due to few strokes can produce the ignition if fuel conditions and rainfall is
adequate, but areas that are more thunderstorms prone, related with long-term flash density,
are more likely to produce lightning-caused wildfires.

9
 V International Conference on Forest Fire Research
D. X. Viegas (Ed.), 2006

Location of ignitions
The most significant fire weather index in all cases is Duff Moisture Code (Table 7),
with p-values always under 0.001, thus the selection of ignitions of the 3x3 cell for each
thunderstorm causing a wildfire will be the one with highest DMC code of all possible 3x3
candidate cells. The results of those cells are shown in Figure 2. From this figure we
confirm that most of lightning ignited forest fires are located in mountainous areas.
Table 7. U-Mann-Whitney results for temporal patterns
Madrid Teruel Joint
U Z Sig. U Z Sig. U Z Sig.
Flash_ha_storm 15470.50 -1.340 0.180 874830.50 -0.059 0.953 1118340.50 -0.638 0.523
Pos_ha_storm 16872.00 -1.480 0.139 851088.00 -1.145 0.252 1141863.00 -0.468 0.640
Mean_int_storm 13774.00 -2.017 0.044 812732.00 -1.376 0.169 1027648.00 -2.214 0.027
Mean_24hRain 15947.00 -1.177 0.239 684465.00 -4.180 0.000 912373.00 -4.306 0.000
Mean_FFMC 11950.50 -2.744 0.006 588325.50 -6.127 0.000 770507.50 -6.676 0.000
Mean_DMC 10616.50 -3.276 0.001 468708.00 -8.660 0.000 627747.00 -9.153 0.000
Mean_DC 11337.50 -2.989 0.003 542080.00 -7.106 0.000 704457.00 -7.822 0.000
Mean_1h 10914.00 -3.158 0.002 720182.50 -3.335 0.001 918412.00 -4.110 0.000
Mean_10h 10915.00 -3.157 0.002 720204.50 -3.335 0.001 918442.00 -4.109 0.000
Min_24hRain 15908.00 -1.203 0.229 690104.50 -4.107 0.000 918415.50 -4.248 0.000
Max_FFMC 11920.50 -2.756 0.006 574131.00 -6.427 0.000 755926.00 -6.929 0.000
Max_DMC 10370.50 -3.375 0.001 457141.50 -8.904 0.000 610933.00 -9.445 0.000
Max_DC 11061.50 -3.099 0.002 534338.00 -7.270 0.000 693153.00 -8.018 0.000
Min_1h 10909.50 -3.160 0.002 699728.00 -3.768 0.000 895480.50 -4.508 0.000
Min_10h 10910.00 -3.159 0.002 699790.00 -3.767 0.000 895528.00 -4.507 0.000

Figure 2. Location of positive and negative fire ignitions. Left, Autonomous Community of Madrid;
right, Province of Teruel.

Training and validation of the model

The thresholds for elaborating the structural variables from meteorological indices
are shown in Table 8. We have computed those thresholds separately from both regions
under the assumption of different meteorological and physical conditions that both regions
show, may cause ignitions with different dead fuel moisture content.

10
 V International Conference on Forest Fire Research
D. X. Viegas (Ed.), 2006

The criteria for variables selection is based on

Table 8. Thresholds computed to
avoiding colinerarity by only introducing variables non
compute the number of
critical days related, and always searching for a logical interpretation
of the resulting coefficients. The cutting off value for
Madrid Teruel
classification is set to the proportion of positive ignition
FFMC 82.3984 77.8888 cells versus null ignitions cells. In the case of Madrid,
DMC 138.2932 65.8447
this value is 0.02; for Teruel 0.06; and for the joint
DC 520.5574 462.7373
regions, 0.05.These values show the low occurrence of
1h 7.9389 11.2909
lightning-caused fires from a spatial point of view.
10h 9.8668 14.0317
The resulting models for the different datasets
are shown in Table 9. We observe that the variable
“number of dry thunderstorms” is present in all three models, showing us that it is the most
relevant factor in the occurrence of these fires. The variable “DMC” defined as the number
of days with a DMC higher than the critical DMC is also important because it appears in
two of the three models.
The accuracy of the logit
Table 9. Logistic models resulting for all datasets classification for Madrid is shown
in Table 10, both for training and
Variables B Wald Sig. Exp(B)
validation datasets. We can see that
Dry_storm .402 7.484 .006 1.494 it has an overall accuracy of near
Madrid DMC -.014 3.973 .046 .986 72% for both training and
Constant -4.245 21.985 .000 .014
validation sets. On the other hand,
classification of ignitions shows an
Dry_storm .164 22.943 .000 1.178
accuracy of 82% in training set and
Altitude -.002 20.670 .000 .998
Teruel 71% in validation.
Slope .110 18.647 .000 1.117
In the case of Teruel the
Constant -3.729 55.246 .000 .024
global accuracy is around 70% for
both training and validation,
Dry_storm .108 32.795 .000 1.114
whereas classification of ignitions
Slope .054 6.443 .011 1.055
has an accuracy of 70% for
Joint DMC .005 6.895 .009 1.005
validation and 67% for training set.
P100_Foresta .012 5.735 .017 1.012
Constant -5.649 152.044 .000 .004

Table 10. Accuracy of clasification of positive/negative ignitions.

Training set Validation set
Ignition Ignition
0 1 Acc. 0 1 Acc.
Madrid 0 382 146 72.35 0 250 100 71.43
Ignition Ignition
1 2 9 81.82 1 2 5 71.43
Overall Acc. 72.54 Overall Acc. 71.43

0 1 Acc. 0 1 Acc.
Teruel 0 689 283 70.88 0 464 199 69.98
Ignition Ignition
1 18 40 68.97 1 16 32 66.67
Overall Acc. 70.78 Overall Acc. 69.76
0 1 Acc. 0 1 Acc.
Joint 0 948 548 63.37 0 661 355 65.06
Ignition Ignition
1 24 68 73.91 1 8 24 75.00
Overall Acc. 63.98 Overall Acc. 65.36

11
 V International Conference on Forest Fire Research
D. X. Viegas (Ed.), 2006

Finally, in the model with both regions joint, we loose some accuracy, having a
global correct classification of 64% and 65% for training and validation sets, whereas
ignitions are well classified in a 74% of the training dataset and 75% of the validation
dataset.
The resulting maps of probability of a lightning fire along the years 2002-2004 are
shown in Figure 3. We observe that in both regions higher probabilities of having a
lightning-caused fire are concentrated on mountainous areas. On the other hand, probability
of lightning ignited fires is in overall higher in Teruel than Madrid, as we expected given
the historical fire registries.

Figure 3. Probability of ignition of a lightning-caused fire along the years 2002-2004. Left, Madrid;
right, Teruel.

5. Discussion

Orography plays an important role in thunderstorms occurrence (Rivas Soriano e t

al., 2001b; Dissing et al., 2003; Rivas Soriano et al., 2005) and therefore in probability of
occurrence of lightning-caused wildfires (Podur, 2003). We have noted that terrain aspect
plays a different role in both regions according to relative position of mountainous systems
(Table 6). Indeed, lightning occurrence is related with dominant winds (López Ruiz et al.,
1996; Rivas Soriano et al., 2001a). From Table 9 we can see that altitude plays a negative
role in probability of ignition: although several studies have shown a positive relation of
lightning occurrence with altitude (Rivas Soriano et al., 2001b; Dissing et al., 2003), the
rainfall increase and temperatures decrease with altitude can cause this negative
relationship (Díaz-Avalos et al., 2001), also the altitudinal ecological limit of woodlands
also can influence this result (Dissing et al., 2003).
Lightning density has not shown to be related with fuel ignition in the temporal
analysis (Table 7), in fact several studies confirm this result (Rorig et al., 1999; Rorig et al.,
2002). The reason is that higher densities of flashes are followed by higher amounts of
precipitation (Álvarez Lamata, 2005). On the other hand, spatial analysis shows a relation
between lightning density and wildfires (Table 6), similar result is found in Wierzchowski
et al. (2002). This can be explained as a direct consequence of a higher frequency of
thunderstorms in regions with higher lightning density.

12
 V International Conference on Forest Fire Research
D. X. Viegas (Ed.), 2006

Positive lightning occurrence shows no relationship with temporal occurrence of

fires (Table 7), this fact contradicts several studies that conclude that positive lightning are
more likely to produce the ignition due they have a more chances to have a long continuum
current (Kourtz et al., 1991; Latham et al., 2001; Anderson, 2002), and confirms the
previous study of Larjavaara et al. (2005).
From Table 9 we have seen that occurrence of a dry storm is the most important
factor on the probability of ignition, in fact rainfall affects the fuel moisture content (Kourtz
et al., 1991; Rorig et al., 1999; Rorig et al., 2 0 02; Álvarez Lamata, 2005). Also, fire
weather indices have also shown to be significant in ignition (Table 7), the most significant
index have resulted the Duff Moisture Code (Tables 6 and 8), according to Podur (2003)
and Wotton et al. (2005b). On the other hand, Nash et al. (1996) conclude that the ignition
is more related with FMMC than DMC, and DC results non related with ignitions in a study
carried in Alberta and Saskatchewan (Canada). These different results may be explained by
the different environments where those indices have been applied. The different behaviour
of indices is also evident when applying the thresholds to characterise probability of
ignition: we have used a threshold of DMC of 138 and 66 for Madrid and Teruel
respectively whereas Podur (2003) in Ontario (Canada) proposes that ignitions occur with a
DMC higher than 20.

6. Conclusions

We have developed a model for estimating a long-term probability of occurrence of

lightning-caused fires for two different regions in Central Spain. Although the occurrence
of this kind of wildfires between these regions is quite different, we have observed some
common patterns such as orography and meteorological conditions. Occurrence of dry
storms is the most important factor We have established a threshold of 4mm to define a dry
storm, this threshold has been based on previous studies (Rorig et al., 1999; Rorig et al.,
2002; Álvarez Lamata, 2005), in future research we will analyse this information deeper
and we will try to define a more statistical suitable threshold. In the same way, thresholds
applied on fire weather indices have been arbitrary defined as the mean values of these
indices in lightning-caused fire days. Future work will be focused in defining more robust
thresholds, by converting the Canadian codes to estimated fuel moisture content and
applying a stronger statistical methodology in thresholding. On the other hand, an index
that have not been computed but have shown to be more significant in lightning ignitions
than DMC is SDMC (Wotton et al., 2005a; Wotton et al., 2005b). In future research we
will compute it and analyse its behaviour in these mediterranean ecosystems.
In order to develop the model we have made use of logistic regression. This
technique has been widely used in this kind of studies, but it has some limitations in spatial
data, we propose therefore to develop in future worklines a model using another statistical
methodologies such as Artificial Neural Networks or Generalized Linear Mixed Models.
Such methodologies have been successfully applied in similar studies (Vega-García et al.,
1996; Díaz-Avalos et al., 2001; Vasconcelos et al., 2001)

Acknowledgements

We wish to thank the Spanish National Institute of Meteorology and Meteológica

S.A. for all meteorological data provided.

13
 V International Conference on Forest Fire Research
D. X. Viegas (Ed.), 2006

This study has been funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science within the
FIREMAP Project (Integrated Analysis of Forest Fire Risk using Remote Sensing Data and
Geographical Information Systems).

7. References

Álvarez Lamata, E., 2005. Los incendios forestales y las condiciones meteorológicas en
Aragón. 4º Congreso Forestal Español. Zaragoza.
Anderson, K., 2002. A model to predict lighting-caused fire occurrences. International
Journal of Wildland Fire 11, 163-172.
Bradshaw, B.S., Deeming, J.E. (1983). The 1978 National Fire Danger Rating System.
Technical documentation. USDA, Ogden, Utah, .
Díaz-Avalos, C., Peterson, D.L., Alvarado, E., Ferguson, S.A., Besag, J.E., 2001. Space–
time modelling of lightning-caused ignitions in the Blue Mountains, Oregon.
Canadian Journal of Forest Research 31, 1579-1593.
Dissing, D., Verbyla, D.L., 2003. Spatial patterns of lightning strikes in interior Alaska and
their relations to elevation and vegetation. Canadian Journal of Forest Research 33,
770-782.
Dolling, K., Chu, P.-S., Fujioka, F., 2005. A climatological study of the Keetch/Byram
drought index and fire activity in the Hawaiian Islands. Agricultural and Forest
Meteorology 133, 17-27.
Kourtz, P., Todd, B. (1991). Predicting the daily occurrence of lightning-caused forest fires.
Petawawa National Forestry Institute, Forestry Canada., Chalk River, Ontario,
Larjavaara, M., Pennanen, J., Tuomi, T.J., 2005. Lightning that ignites forest fires in
Finland. Agricultural and Forest Meteorology 132, 171-180.
Latham, D., Williams, E., 2001. Lightning and forest fires. In: Johnson, E.A. and
Miyanishi, K. (Eds.), Forest fires. Behavior and ecological aspects. Academic Press,
San Diego, California, pp. 375-418.
López Ruiz, F.J., Pérez Puebla, F., Gutiérrez Núñez, J.M., 1996. Análisis de la distribución
temporal y espacial de los rayos registrados por la red de detección del I.N.M. en el
período de 1992 - 1995. IV Simposio Nacional de Predicción, Madrid.
Martín León, F., 1996. Caracterización de la actividad tormentosa peninsular y áreas
limítrofes durante el periodo estival de 1994. IV Simposio Nacional de Predicción,
Madrid.
McRae, R.H.D., 1992. Prediction of areas prone to lightning ignition. International Journal
of Wildland Fire 2(3), 123-130.
Nash, C.H., Johnson, E.A., 1996. Synoptic climatology of lightning-caused forest fires in
subalpine and boreal forests. Canadian Journal of Forest Research 26(10), 1859-
1874.
Podur, 2003. Spatial patterns of lightning-caused forest fires in Ontario, 1976–1998.
Ecological Modelling 164, 1-20.
Rivas Soriano, L., De Pablo, F., García Díez, E., 2001a. Meteorological and geo-
orographical relationships with lightning activity in Castilla-Leon (Spain).
Meteorological Applications 8, 169-175.
Rivas Soriano, L., de Pablo Dávila, F., García Díez, E., 2001b. Cloud-to-ground lightning
activity in the Iberian Peninsula:1992-1994. Journal of Geophysical Research
106(D-11), 11891-11901.

14
 V International Conference on Forest Fire Research
D. X. Viegas (Ed.), 2006

Rivas Soriano, L., de Pablo Dávila, F., Tomás, C., 2005. Ten-year study of cloud-to-ground
lightning activity in the Iberian Peninsula. Journal of Atmospheric and Solar-
Terrestrial Physics 67, 1632-1639.
Rodríguez y Silva, F., 2002. Visual Forest Fire Weather Index (VFFWI) a mathematical
model for the prediction of forest fires weather danger in Mediterranean
ecosystems. IV Conference on Forest Fire Research. ADAI, Luso, Portugal.
Rorig, M.L., Ferguson, S.A., 1999. Characteristics of lightning and wildland fire ignition in
the Pacific Northwest. Journal of Applied Meteorology 38, 1565-1575.
Rorig, M.L., Ferguson, S.A., 2002. The 2000 Fire Season: Lightning-Caused Fires. Journal
of Applied Meteorology 41, 786-791.
Sebastián, A., San-Miguel-Ayanz J., Burgan R.E., 2002. Integration of satellite sensor data,
fuel type maps and meteorological observation for evaluation of forest fire risk at
the pan-European scale. International Journal of Remote Sensing 23(13): 2713-
2719.
Simard, A.J., 1968. The moisture content of forest fuels. A review of the basic concepts'.
Information Report: FF-X-14. Forest Fire Research Institute. Ottawa, Ontario.pp. 47
Van Wagner, C.E., 1987. Development and structure of the Canadian Forest Fire Weather
Index System. Canadian Forest Service, Otawa
Vasconcelos, M.J.P., Silva, S., Tomé, M., Alvim, M., Pereira, J.M.C., 2001. Spatial
prediction of fire ignition probabilities: comparing logistic regression and neural
networks. Photogrammetric Engineering and Remote Sensing 67(1), 73-83.
Vega-García, C., Lee, B., Wooddard, T., 1996. Applying neural network technology to
human-caused wildfire occurence prediction. AI Applications 10(3), 9-18.
Vélez, R., 2000. La defensa contra incendios forestales. Fundamentos y experiencias.
McGraw-Hill. Interamericana de España S.A.U., Madrid.
Wierzchowski, J., Heathcott, M., Flannigan, M.D., 2002. Lightining and lightning fire,
central cordillera, Canada. International Journal of Wildland Fire 11(1), 41-51.
Wotton, B.M., Martell, D.L., 2005a. A lightning fire occurrence model for Ontario.
Canadian Journal of Forest Research 35, 1389-1401.
Wotton, B.M., Stocks, B.J., Martell, D.L., 2005b. An index for tracking sheltered forest
floor moisture within the Canadian Forest Fire Weather Index System. International
Journal of Wildland Fire 14, 169-182.

15