Remote sensing of forest fires in Southern Europe using IRS-WiFS and MODIS data

Forest fires in Southern Europe are a major source of concern for environmental security. Every year several hundred thousand hectares of forest are burned. These fires put at risk, not only human life and property but also the sustainability of forests. Hence, it is important to have an accurate and timely knowledge of the total area burned during the fire season as well as the type of forest that is burned. Until now, IRS-WiFS 180 meters spatial resolution images were used to map the burnt areas after the fire season in Southern Europe. However, the lack of a short-wave infrared band is in certain cases a limitation for the detectability of the burnt areas. Fusion of IRS-WiFS with MODIS 500 meters spatial resolution images, that has short-wave infrared bands, could improve the mapping of burned areas. We present results on the data fusion of both images over the Iberian Peninsula on September 25th of 2000. The fused images were obtained through local correlation modeling resulting in MODIS bands of 180 meters pixels. The preliminary results show a good potential to improve the burned area mapping in Southern Europe by using the IRS-WiFS higher spatial resolution images in conjunction with the MODIS short-wave infrared bands.