Presentation given at the Wildfire 2011 conference in Buxton on 14 September 2011.

1. Preparing for Wildfire
in the UK
Tarbet, Loch Nevis

2. Simon Thorp
• Qualified Rural Chartered Surveyor
• Chartered Environmentalist
• Director of The Heather Trust
– since May 2002
• Vice-Chairman England & Wales
Wildfire Forum
• Director Scotland’s Moorland Forum
• Based in Dumfries
– Covers all UK and beyond

3. The Plan
• Introduction
• Impressions from International Wildfire Conference
• Questions
• What is the scale of the UK’s wildfire problem?
• What should we be doing about it?
• Can we learn lessons from other countries?
• Conclusions

4. Introduction

5. The Heather Trust
• What is The Heather Trust?
– A charity
– Dedicated to moorland management
throughout the UK
– A membership organisation
• What do we do?
– Seek to integrate all management
– provide an independent view
– work for & with: private landowners,
farmers, agencies & NGOs
– contribute to committees & consultations

6. Current areas of
activity

7. Current areas of
activity

8. Current areas of
activity

9. Current areas of
activity

10. Current areas of
activity

11. Wildfire Interest
Source: Sea-viewing Wide Field-of-View Sensor (SeaWiFS) Project, NASA-GSFC, and ORBIMAGE, 18 April 2003

12. South Africa
9 - 13 May 2011

13. Wildfire Conference,
South Africa, May 2011
• Chance to mix with international
wildfire community
• Soak up other people’s ideas
• Put UK issues in perspective
• Bring some ideas back
• Interesting timing
– Fires burning across UK

14. Impressions 1
• Scale of global wildfire
– 350-400m ha p.a.
– size of India
• Effect of climate change
– Increasing temperature ➨ fire activity
– Link between temperature and rainfall
– +10% precipitation = 1oC
• Spanish problem
– Current area of wildfire 148,000 ha p.a.
– Climate change model – medium scenario
– Increasing to 1,526,000 ha by 2050
– Exacerbated by weather events

15. Impressions 2
• South Africa
– Expenditure R306m
– Forestry losses from wildfire R3.6 bn
– Fire suppression target 368,000 ha p.a.
• Wildfire risk reduction
– Prescribed burning an accepted policy
– Fight fire with fire
• Flames do not need to be put out
• Fire is a natural phenomenon
– Not a new problem
– Going to see more of it
• Poor communities rely on open fires
– Cooking, heating - more sources of ignition

16. Impressions 3
• Australia Black Saturday – 7 Feb 2009
– 450,000 ha burnt, 173 deaths, 2029 houses lost,
cost $Aus 4Bn
• Smoke pollution – Russia
– July / August 2010
– 55,800 people premature deaths

17. Impressions 4
• International cooperation
– Enormous amount of work in progress
– Research
– Development of techniques
• Better application of science
– Fire danger rating systems
– Better understanding of science
– Modelling
– Fire weather index
• UK a poor relation
– A reluctant player
– Great benefit to be had from improving links

18. Fire Danger Rating
Prediction

19. Fire Danger
Rating Table

20. Questions

21. What is the scale of the UK’s
wildfire problem?
• Not on a par with other fire
countries:
– Mediterranean
– USA, Canada
– Africa
– India
• But still significant
– Not all about remote hillsides
– Swinley Forest
– Dorset Heaths
– South Wales

22. What should we be doing
about it?
• More top down support
– Wildfire can happen anywhere
– Impact on critical infrastructure
– Closure of M3 during the Olympics
– Meeting with DCLG
– Funding needed
• Better organisation on the ground
– Fire Groups
– Peak District Fire Operations Group
– Northumberland FRS
– Integration of landowners / managers
– Decision Support System for Prescribed
Burning

23. Can we learn lessons from
other countries?
• Yes – wake up UK
• Fire modelling and prediction
• Fire management ➨ fire
suppression
– delicate balancing act
– protection vs conservation
• Heather burning / muirburn /
swaling
– Risk reduction tool
– Apply science
• Stop being precious about fire
– Fuel load rises
– Catastrophic risk increases

24. Conclusions
• Wildfire can strike anywhere
• Effect of climate change
– May 2011 could become a regular feature
• Need to plan and prepare
– Wildfire is not an exceptional event
– Expect it to happen
– When the FRS is called is too late
• Improve level of FRS preparedness
• Wildfire Forum & Fire Groups
• It could happen here
– The Australian Black Saturday
– Russian Smoke pollution