Researchers Seek to Use Drones For Brushfire Forecasting

schliz writes "Australian researchers expect to use unmanned aircraft in bushfire surveillance and search and rescue scenarios within two years. The news comes as New South Wales faces 'catastrophic' fire danger ratings and what firefighters say could be the worst conditions in the state's history."

Comments

Headline will read:

[toygeek]

Unmanned Aircraft crash causes Catastrophic brushfire

Re:Headline will read:

[Cryacin]

You know, if Australia backburned a bit more often, bushfires would rage far less viciously across the landscape.

Re:Headline will read:

[donaldm]

Back-burning is a fairly common way of reducing the bush-fire threat and is actually carried out in most Australian cities especially in the cooler months. The problem you have is that Australia is huge (a little smaller then the continental USA) with a population of approximately 22 million compared to the USA's 312 million. Normally when a bush fire starts and is in a remote place it can be very difficult get enough firefighters into the area. It is not feasible to back-burn bush-land unless you have a considerable amount of man-power and resources especially water which may be in short supply.

Having drone aircraft for bush-file spotting is actually a very good cost effective idea especially if you can fly a fire-fighting team into the area before the fire gets out of control. Unfortunately even as I write we have record temperatures (approx 40 to 44 degrees C) and strong winds and many bush fires that have started today are in difficult to get to areas and almost impossible to put out.

Re:Headline will read:

[niftydude]

Also it's fucking hot out here. As in - my tyres got sticky in the car park hot out here.

In fact - it is so hot that the Bureau of Meteorology has just added new colours to its weather forecasting chart - because the previous chart colour range capped at 50C and in the coming weeks we are going to need more.

I kid you not.

Re:Headline will read:

[bloodhawk]

It is all but impossible to come even close to back burning enough to prevent these fires, Australia definitely doesn't backburn enough, more often then not it is prevented by greenies or do-gooders that think they are helping the bush by trying to prevent it, however Australia is massive and many of these fires rage in inaccessible bushland, the best we can do is better protect towns and houses, even then many residents are their own worst enemies as they want their big shady gum trees near their houses.

Re:Headline will read:

[jamesh]

Back-burning is a fairly common way of reducing the bush-fire threat and is actually carried out in most Australian cities especially in the cooler months. The problem you have is that Australia is huge (a little smaller then the continental USA) with a population of approximately 22 million compared to the USA's 312 million. Normally when a bush fire starts and is in a remote place it can be very difficult get enough firefighters into the area. It is not feasible to back-burn bush-land unless you have a considerable amount of man-power and resources especially water which may be in short supply.

That, and "backburning fire out of control" is not an uncommon headline.

Real-time Australian Bushfire Map

[Jeremy Lee]

This map combines near real-time information (hourly to daily updates) from multiple public agencies to give a composite view of fire incidents affecting Australia.
http://www.unorthodox.com.au/fire/

It's getting hot, hot, hot!

[Scoldog]

We've just updated our temperature maps with new colors to indicate the higher temperatures

http://www.smh.com.au/environment/weather/temperatures-off-the-charts-as-australia-turns-deep-purple-20130108-2ce33.html

Live from Sydney, sweating through 39 degree Celsius heat (Still not the 43 degree heat they promised us, but it's 4:30 in the afternoon so we still have a few hours for it to heat up).

Re:I hope the drones use Google Maps

[Scoldog]

In Aus, we call them bushfires. To me, brushfire sounds similiar to what we would call a grass fire. Nothing too concerning about them.

If you hear that a bushfire is coming, get your gear and get the hell out of town.

Re:I hope the drones use Google Maps

[donaldm]

BTW, title mentions Brushfires, summary says Bushfires; which is correct?

Actually both are correct, however in Austrlia we normally refer to areas that are not cultivated or in a city or town as The Bush hence the term "Bushfire" is used to refer to fires in those area. We also have the term Grass-fire which is rather obvious however this can be quite dangerous as well,

Canberra here

[Sasayaki]

Reporting from the ACT, which is a tiny territory wholly within New South Wales.

Today's tempretures were "real fucking hot", about 38 C/39 C, and the wind is really strong. Whipping up dust all over the place, buffeting the car around as I drove, etc etc. The grass around is quite rich and quite dry, like little golden fields. I actually used the lush grass in a Kindle serial set in Canberra, because it's really pretty and there's a lot of it (and it's very dry). Very, very similar to the big fires that swept through here a decade ago (I was here for that).

It's overcast and cooler now, but earlier today it wouldn't have taken much to light everything up. Some people who lived out in the rural areas are staying home today because they're expecting fires.

I expect tomorrow and the day after will be not as bad, because there's a lot of cloud that's moved in, but later in the week will be bad.