Student researcher

Michael Storey Research Leader

This research analysed operational line scan mapping produced by the NSW Rural Fire Service and Victorian Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning to understand spot fire behaviour, including distance from main fire front, number of spot fires, their size and their growth. Extreme bushfire behaviour predictions are based on a limited number of observations. This PhD provides important tools to improve the understanding of spot fire and ember behaviour in dry forests of south east Australia, complementing and improving existing fire behaviour models.

This project was submitted in February 2021.

Empirical analysis of spot‐fire and firebrand behaviour during extreme fire weather conditions
29 Jun 2017
Occurence of spot-fires is very difficult to obserfve and predict, especially in extreme bushfires....
Long-distance spot-fires: An empirical analysis
19 Sep 2018
Bushfires can ignite spot-fires at very long distances downwind. The number and maximum distance of spot-...
31 Aug 2020
Key findings: Spot fires and topography interact to enhance fire rate of spread.