Forest Fires in the Russian Federation: 2 August 1999
Forest Fires in the Russian Federation
2 August 1999
At present a large heat wave with temperatures on record height threatens the Russian Federation. The day temperatures lay constantly over the 30 degree mark within June and July. The average temperature lies around five degrees higher than usual. Extended dryness is reported for the whole country, with some rains in Khabarovsk region (direct report from the Far East Forest Research Institute, dated today). Meteorologists predict record temperatures also for August 1999. Forest fire danger continues to increase.
The NOAA AVHRR satellite image composite of 2 August 1999 shows fire activities in eastern Russia.
Fig.1. This NOAA AVHRR composite of 2 August 1999 was generated at 00:13 GMT and used for this composite the satellite NOAA 12 and 14. The red squares indicate regions of active fires.
(Source: The satellite maps containing fire information can be accessed under “Cloudiness Maps” at http://nffc.infospace.ru/engl/main.htm)
For details (enlargements, other scenes produced earlier or later) the GFMC readers are encouraged to click on the hyperlinks provided by the Avialesookhrana website. The Avialesookhrana homepage from the National Forest Fire Centre of Russia provides up-to-date NOAA images for the whole of the Russian Federation at http://nffc.infospace.ru/engl/main.htm . The web site of the Space Monitoring Information Support Laboratory provides extensive links to sites with satellite imagery for the Russian Federation, meteorological information as well as fire related images are accessible.
The Aerial Forest Fire Protection Service Avialesookhrana of the Federal Forest Service of Russia reports the state of fire in the 1999 fire season to the GFMC. The latest report is from 29 July 1999:
Up to 29 July 1999 a total 22,333 fires occurred in forests under the control of the Federal Forest Service of Russia burning a total of 409,811 ha of forest and 159,003 ha non-forested areas (inside forest lands).
During the day of 28 July 1999 a total of 529 fires were burning and affected 4,918 ha forest and 1,189 ha non-forest land. The region with the highest fire activity on 28 July were:
Volga region – 64 fires – 2,138 ha (forest and non forest)
Irkutsk region – 64 fires- 379 ha
Krasnoyarsk region – 27 fires – 437 ha
Leningrad region – 60 fires – 25 ha
Novgorod region – 64 fires – 40 ha
Tomsk region – 25 fires – 597 ha
Khabarovsk region – 23 fires – 1,456 ha
Some large fires (over 3000 ha) burning in Vologda, Novgorod, Leningrad regions, totalling 20.
The National Forest Fire Center of Russia AVIALESOOKHRANA realizes forest and deer pasture fire control on a territory of more than 800 million ha. The structure of Avialesookhrana includes 21 Regional Forest Fire Centers (aviation bases), two independent subdivisions, uniform clothes factory and the Vladimir state aviation company. Avialesookhrana rents annually from the Civil aviation companies 600 aircraft and has its own aviation park consisting of 60 aircraft including fixedwing planes and helicopters, 20 from them are airtankers and airscoopers. The staff of Avialesookhrana consists of highly skilled specialists: 520 pilot-observes, 4500 smokejumpers and helirappellers as well as more than 2,300 other specialists.
The average number of fires occurs annually are 15,000-30,000. With the help of aviation are detected about 85% and put out more than 60% of total fires in Russian forests.
For more details on fire in the Russian Federation: See IFFN Country Notes.
Scientific details on fire in the Russian Federation are provided by the Fire Research Campaign Asia-North (FIRESCAN) report.
Bibliography on fire in ecosystems of boreal Eurasia:
One of the results of the first international fire science conference in the Russian Federation (1993) was the publication of a monograph on fire in boreal Eurasia, including some selected contributions on boreal North America. The literature cited in the monograph contains numerous publications which in many cases are not easily accessible. To facilitate literature search the bibliographical sources are provided by topic (chapter).
