Investigation of vegetation fire plumes using paragliders tracks and micro-scale meteorological model

Abstract

This work presents an interesting and unique analysis of an open air fire plume extrapolated from a large amount of paragliders tracks flying over a sugarcane fire during a world cup super final event in february 2013 Columbia. Vertical speeds of over 20 m/s were observed into a narrow core just over the fire. Simulation of the same event shown the relatively good ability of micro-scale meteorological models to represent quantitatively the velocity fields and behavior.