The Effects of Winds From Burning Structures on Ground-Fire Propagation at the Wildland-Urban Interface

Published

June 1, 2008

Author(s)

Ronald G. Rehm

Abstract

A simple physics-based mathematical model is developed for prediction of the propagation of a grass-fire front driven by an ambient wind and by entrainment winds generated from one or moreburning structures. This model accounts for the heterogeneous nature of the burning in a particular wildland-urban-interface (WUI) setting, where the entrainment from fundamentally three-dimensional structure-fire plumes can change the propagation of a two-dimensional ground-fire front. Data on grass and structure fires are presented and compared to justify the model. Scaling effects on the fire-front propagation-speed are given as afunction of the location of the front, of the heat release rate of a single burning structure, of the total number of burning structures and of the burning-structure density. Also, detailedfront propagation changes due to a single and multipleburning-house scenarios are presented.

Citation

Canadian Journal of Forest Research-Revue Canadienne De Recherche Forestiere

Volume

12

Issue

3

Pub Type

Journals

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Keywords

burning structures, fire research, grass fires, heterogeneous burning, mathematical model, model of fire propagation, physics-based model, plume-entrainment wind, wildland-urban interface

Citation

Rehm, R. (2008), The Effects of Winds From Burning Structures on Ground-Fire Propagation at the Wildland-Urban Interface, Canadian Journal of Forest Research-Revue Canadienne De Recherche Forestiere, [online], https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=861414 (Accessed October 14, 2025)