Fire Weather Index - Monthly Mean, 1979-2020

Context The Canadian Fire Weather Index System (FWI) is used to assess fire danger in a harmonized way across Europe. The FWI uses information about fuel moisture and weather conditions to determine fire behaviour.

Definition The fire weather index indicates fire intensity by combining the rate of fire spread with the amount of fuel being consumed. The fire weather index is calculated using the Canadian Forest Service Fire Weather Index rating system (FWI). The fire danger model used to produce the dataset is the Global ECMWF Fire Forecast model (GEFF). The fire danger model takes into account temperature, relative humidity, wind speed, precipitation, drought conditions, fuel availability, vegetation characteristics and topography.

Data Sources The fire weather index is calculated using weather forecasts from historical simulations provided by the ECMWF ERA5 reanalysis. The fire weather index is part of a dataset produced by the Copernicus Emergency Management Service (CEMS) for the European Forest fire Information System (EFFIS).

Understand It is customary to quote a danger class as well as an index number. The fire weather index can be categorised into 6 classes of danger as follows: Very low danger: FWI is less than 5.2. Low danger: FWI is between 5.2 and 11.2. Moderate danger: FWI is between 11.2 and 21.3. High danger: FWI is between 21.3 and 38.0. Very high danger: FWI is between 38.0 and 50. Extreme danger: FWI is greater than 50.

Supporting Information The data was collated on behalf of the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S). Further information about this index can be found in the C3S documentation resources in the Climate Data Store.

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Visualisation and Navigation The annual mean fire weather index for each year from 1979 to 2020 is plotted on a map showing the European NUTS aggregation regions. The EUROSTAT NUTS classification (Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics) is a hierarchical system for dividing up the economic territory of Europe. The size of the regions shown on the map can be adjusted by selecting the appropriate NUTS level: national level (NUTS-0), first sub-national level (NUTS-1), and second sub-national level (NUTS-2).

The regions on the map facilitate dynamic access to the underlying data. Hover the mouse pointer over a region to view its name or click on a region to request a time series plot. Likewise, the trans-national average for the EEA member and cooperating countries (EEA 38) can be accessed via the "Europe" bounding box.

The time series plot shows the area mean fire weather index for the chosen region for each month of the chosen year.

Click and hover the mouse over the time series plot to view the data values and to reveal action buttons for features such as “zoom” and “download plot as a png”. Links below the plot enable the download of time series data in the spreadsheet compatible .csv format.