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Resource-Management Tool Fires Up BC Forest Service
Each year, British Columbia sees 3,500 wildfires on average. When these fires threaten communities, endangered species habitats, or valuable timberlands, halting their spread becomes vital. This dangerous task falls to the Protection Branch of the BC Forest Service, an organization that now has the ability to use the Canadian Geospatial Data Infrastructure (CGDI) to help battle—and conquer—the province’s wildfires.
With $160,000 in funding and technical support from GeoConnections and in partnership with Vancouver’s Selkirk Systems, the Protection Branch developed a prototype technology known as Resource Management for Emergency Response System (RMERS). This technology uses the CGDI to enhance the Branch’s proprietary dispatch system—“Dispatch 2005.”
The Protection Branch used the dispatch application to manage fire-reporting calls, air-tanker requests, and other administrative details, but the application was limited to the Branch’s internal data sets. To give itself and its front-line crews an advantage when battling fires, the Protection Branch upgraded Dispatch 2005 to interoperate with CGDI-compliant data layers. RMERS was subsequently born, and now the Protection Branch can get a far better picture of a fire—and how to combat it.
For instance, when a fire is reported now, the Protection Branch can call up a CGDI-based digital elevation model of the area and then overlay another CGDI data layer that depicts species at risk. Another layer might reveal the proximity of a neighbouring town. Combining these various views—a capability offered by the CGDI—equips fire-management teams with a potent fire-fighting ally: information. Fire management teams can use this information to assign and coordinate firefighters, equipment, and other resources more efficiently, both on the ground and in the air.
“Linking our dispatch tool with the CGDI allows us to bring more information into our decision-making process,” said Mr. Steve Newton, forest protection officer, Lillooet Fire Zone with the BC Forest Service, Protection Branch. “Our application is much more enabled now. It’s more powerful.”
And as the CGDI evolves, fire-management personnel will also be able to manage multi-jurisdictional land-management issues and stakeholder interests more effectively when fires strike. Other wildfire agencies in Canada are now evaluating RMERS or a variant of it for their programs.
Better frontline insight improves fire-fighting effectiveness
RMERS relies on CGDI-endorsed mapping services that standardize the way web maps are requested and generated. For instance, users employ these services to determine which data layers to include in their maps and to specify a map’s size. Thanks to CGDI data-interoperability standards and services, users now have a world of geospatial information at their fingertips—all available through the Internet. The Protection Branch is taking full advantage of this capability.
“RMERS allows us to assemble teams and assign them to certain geographic areas of a fire,” said Mr. Newton. “For example, the Branch can display its initial attack crews on an ortho background photograph. By knowing where our crews are, we’re better able to coordinate their efforts and minimize their risks.” (Ortho background photos are aerial photographs of the Earth corrected to remove distortions caused by camera tilt and terrain relief.)
Making RMERS available across Canada
Initially, the Branch considered selling RMERS to other provincial and regional fire-fighting branches across Canada to recoup development costs. But the organization’s philosophy has changed. By making RMERS available for free, the Branch hopes to get access to data or other programs in return.
Mr. Newton sees plenty of potential to expand RMERS. For example, he would like the application to include all contacts in the Branch’s resource database—electricians, hotels, water-truck companies, caterers, and so on. In the event of a fire, the Protection Branch would call up the needed resources and query their whereabouts on an ortho photograph.
Thanks to web-mapping technology, the CGDI, and support from GeoConnections, the BC Forest Service now has a web-based fire-fighting tool that may prove as useful as an 11,000-litre air tanker. Those who live or work in fire-prone areas will greatly applaud this development, for it could one day save their homes and businesses, if not their lives.
Partners include: British Columbia Forest Service Protection Branch; Natural
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| GeoConnections is a national partnership initiative to evolve and expand the Canadian Geospatial Data Infrastructure. |