LESSONS LEARNED FROM RAPID RESPONSE RESEARCH ON WILDLAND FIRES

Fire Management Today, Winter 2007 by Lentile, Leigh, Morgan, Penny, Hardy, Colin, Hudak, Andrew, Et al

In recent years, more researchers are collecting data either on active wildfires or immediately after wildfire occurrence. Known as Rapid Response Research, this important undertaking provides real-time information, useful data, and improved tools for managers.

Rapid Response Research can encompass fire ecology, burn severity, fire behavior, firefighter safety, emissions, erosion, vegetation response, remote sensing, and a multitude of various fire-related topics.

By using this Rapid Response Research, we have the potential to link fire effects to conditions before, during, and after fires. This information is critical to building the next generation of tools for forecasting the consequences of fire and fuels management.

In this way, Rapid Response Research products are also helping fire managers and local land managers make informed decisions about the ecological and social consequences of fire.

At the same time, however, Rapid Response Researchers can complicate resource and personnel management for managers during critical emergency periods on wildfires. Researchers must therefore be constantly aware of the challenges of conducting research on active wildfires (see sidebar). They must understand and work closely with fire management organizations without compromising these managers' primary tasks.

Fire scientists and fire managers have long worked closely together, but if they are to successfully address today's complex wildland fire challenges, they must now work together even more closely.

Teams of research scientists and technicians have an increasing presence in today's fire camps. Demands for information and accountability from the media and general public also peak during large fire incidents.

The added safety and logistical requirements required for Rapid Response Research are justifiable only if the research data can be effectively collected-and we learn information that we cannot ascertain by any other means.

What Is Rapid Response Research? How Is it Different From Other Fire Research?

Certain types of information or data that are essential to our understanding of wildland fire can only be obtained during, or immediately after, a fire. Large fires can provide unique opportunities for assessing fire behavior, fire effects, fuel treatments, and social responses on a landscape scale.

Rapid, well-organized, and preplanned responses from the science community must therefore be organized to gather data on actively burning fires.

If advance planning and funding for a timely research response is not in place, critical data could be lost.

By the time funding is obtained, the research opportunity has often passed, or other factors-precipitation, faded memories, changing seasons-have masked or destroyed important information.

In the past, research on active fires has been hampered by:

* Lack of funding,

* Inadequate preseason planning and coordination,

* Poor adoption or adherence by researchers to the incident command system, and

* Lack of acceptance or tolerance of research by incident management teams (IMTs).

The governing board of the USDA/ USDOI Joint Fire Science Program (JFSP), a partnership of six Federal wildland fire management and research organizations, has provided financial support for teams of research scientists and technical specialists that can mobilize quickly to investigate fire behavior or fire effects on active fire incidents.

The JFSP funding agency provides scientific information and support for fuel and fire management programs. The JFSP funding agency also requires scientist-manager partnerships that place a strong emphasis on transferring research findings to the field.

How Is Rapid Response Research Conducted?

Advance Planning Proves to be Crucial

Rapid Response Research teams must coordinate with fire management teams to quantify conditions immediately before, during, and after wildfires and prescribed burns. Rapid Response projects are expected to take advantage of opportunities to obtain information on large fires.

Traditionally, researchers conceived research questions and designed experiments beforehand and submitted competitive research proposals. If awarded, they then developed operations' plans, participated in training sessions, and purchased equipment. With Rapid Response Research, however, the study area is not defined until after a fire ignites and various research criteria are met.

Researchers must therefore be ready to decide-within dayswhether a given fire will be sampled and travel to the fire on short notice, strategize data collection, and coordinate with IMTs to ensure safe operations. Rapid Response Research teams must always be prepared for efficient mobilization, be flexible, and be cognizant of management concerns.

A Rapid Response Research team led by Elaine Kennedy Sutherland, Forest Service research biologist, performed Rapid Response Research on seven fires around Missoula, MT, in 2003. Sutherland's team focused on fire effects on fish and fish habitat.

Coordinating with local land management decisionmakers and IMTs, a crew of six researchers located small streams with known native trout populations or potential trout habitat. They then established sample sites near actively burning fires-locations likely to burn in a day or two-taking measurements, setting up instruments, and surveying fish populations.