Degree
Master of Science
Program
Statistics and Actuarial Sciences
Supervisor
Dr. Douglas Woolford
Abstract
The duration of a forest fire depends on many factors, such as weather, fuel type and fuel moisture, as well as fire management strategies. Understanding how these impact the duration of a fire can lead to more effective suppression efforts as this information can be incorporated into decision support systems used by fire management agencies to help allocate suppression resources. This thesis presents a thorough survival analysis of lightning and people-caused fires in the Intensive fire management zone of Ontario, Canada from 1989 through 2004. The analysis is then extended to investigate spatial patterns across this region using proportional hazards Gaussian shared frailty models. The resulting posterior estimates suggest spatial patterns across this zone. A fire load model is also developed by coupling a fire occurrence model with a survival model and is explored via simulation. Marked cluster processes were found to nicely capture the overall fire load trend over the fire season.
Recommended Citation
Morin, Amy A., "A Spatial Analysis of Forest Fire Survival and a Marked Cluster Process for Simulating Fire Load" (2014). Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository. 2192.
https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/etd/2192