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APLICATION OF LOW RESOLUTION SATELLITE DATA FOR THE DETECTION AND
MONITORING OF FIRE IN NICARAGUA
S Mejía", L Valerio ,C Coronado
"Planning Division, Asociación de Municipalidades de Nicaragua, Managua Nicaragua. smejia(@ibw.com.ni
"Department of Physical Planning, Ministerio de Agricultura y Forestal, Managua, Nicaragua. lvalerioh(thotmail.com
"Enviromental Information System, Ministerio del Ambiente y los Recursos Naturales, Managua Nicaragua - ccoronado(@sinia.net.ni
KEY WORDS: Forest fire, Monitoring, Change Detection, Ecosystem, Temporal, image
ABSTRACT:
À PC — based -NOAA satellite receiver, installed at the Ministerio del Ambiente y los Recursos Naturales (MARENA) headquarter in
Managua, enable daily observations to be made on vegetation fires in Nicaragua and Central America. These observations are used
particularly to assist and support operational forest management activities in Nicaragua. The technical approach and findings are
presented with reference to forest fire in Nicaragua during the last five dry season (January-May 1999 to 2003). A Geographic
Information System (GIS) is used in order to attempt to identify fire activity patterns. Spatial and time distributions of hot spot are
assessed with regard to forest/land use type, coverage, population density, and rural poverty levels. Some features of fire activity in
Nicaragua are highlighted by considering some local cases in particular.
INTRODUCTION
Fire is a very well utilized and efficient tool for agricultural In MARENA headquarter, since 1995 and under the technical
purposes. But, the inadequate use of fire have had an adverse and financial cooperation from the National Resource Institute
effect on the environment, such as destruction of commercial of England a PC-based NOAA satellite receiving ground station
loggings, loss of biodiversity and threats to the security of was established of the series NOAA/AVHR (National
communities among others. On the other hand most of the Oceanographic Atmospheric Administration/Advanced Very
developing countries have strong limitations for large area High Radiometer Resolution). This allows MARENA to
monitoring. Improvement in the collection and analysis of data produce information on a regular basis about the natural
through the introduction of remote sensing technology allow resources over the whole of Nicaragua.
obtaining regular and timely information for most of the land
areas of the world.
Why using NOAA/AVHRR images in Nicaragua
Although NOAA satellites are widely used for weather forecasting
purposes, the AVHRR sensor has proved their great potential for
monitoring purposes. It has the following advantages:
Il. Allows the global picture observation for the region of ^ 4. Sensor radiometric resolution is high; 10 bits. This means
Central America, at an altitude of 850 km. Fig.2. that within each spectral band it can be distinguished 2 ' =
1024 levels of radiance.
2. Provide a high temporal resolution, capturing 4 images per :
day. 5. Provide their data without charge and is available on a daily
basis.
3. Spectral resolution allows to derive a great variety of
environmental information (five channels, from the visible to
the infrared)
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