Influence of relief on the vegetation fires occurrences in the urban area of Juiz de Fora, MG, Brazil

Abstract

Wildfires cause irreversible damage to the environment, whether in the flora, fauna, people and large economic losses. Knowing the profile of forest fires, traced through different variables, it is essential to have guidelines to establish polices for protection planning. The statistics of occurrences are the main tools to know the profile of fires to planning the prevention and to control more efficiently, reducing costs, time and fight risk. This study used the coordinates of each of the 3,754 occurrences in the city of Juiz de Fora, MG, Brazil, for the period 01/01/2002 to 12/31/2011. The land aspect, the shape and the slope land of each event was determined in order to analyze the influence of the relief on the number of fire occurrence. According to the results, the relief influences directly the occurrence and fire spread. The northern aspect with greater slope and forms that facilitate the flow of water had a higher number of cases. The influence of relief is also confirmed by the relationship between wind direction and occurrences. Land exposures that directly receive the daily prevailing winds have a higher probability of occurrence of fire.