RSRU – Advanced Fire Information System (AFIS)

Veld and fynbos fires in southern Africa during the dry seasons account for costly damage to human life and settlements, infrastructure, land cover, stock and game annually. In partnership with Eskom, the University of Maryland and NASA, and with funding from the South African government, the CSIR has developed the advanced fire information system (AFIS) to locate fires in near-real time over southern Africa.

Active fires are detected using data from the moderate resolution image spectro radiometer (MODIS) sensor on NASA's Aqua and Terra satellites. AFIS determines the exact location of active fires on a map (each dot on the fire map shows an active fire varying in size from 200 m to 1 000 m) and sends a text message (SMS) to allow Eskom to respond quickly to fires in the proximity of transmission line to reduce damage and power supply disruptions. This application of remote sensing coupled with cell phone technology for alert messaging, or SMSs, is the first of its kind in the world.

The cell phone alert contains cryptic but accurate information to lead fire fighters to the exact location of fires in the vicinity of transmission lines: MSG, 1,04 km, NW, 2CMN/CHV223, 08:00 SAST (satellite, distance from line, direction to closest pylon, line name and pylon number, local time of detection).

The benefits of AFIS have gone beyond that of a dedicated warning system. An agreement between the CSIR, Eskom and the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) determined that fire maps based on data supplied by the CSIR and Eskom be broadcast free of charge, for viewing as part of the television weather bulletin. On 7 June 2006, the SABC became the first public broadcaster worldwide to show active fire maps. These appeared on both SABC2 and SABC3. Based on CSIR-supplied fire location information, maps are produced by the SABC and have since been broadcast once a week (with brief interruptions due to programming changes) to viewers as an alert to the presence and prevalence of fires throughout the country.

A recent software upgrade of the AFIS system has made it possible to send SMS alerts to a range of recipients. Commenting on this development, researcher Philip Frost of the Meraka Institute (a national research centre of the CSIR) notes, “It is now possible for the AFIS system to send SMS alerts to registered fire protection associations (FPAs) countrywide.” This puts valuable information on the location of fires into the hands of officers within these voluntary organisations, which in turn coordinate fire fighting efforts with those of Working on Fire of the departments of Water Affairs and Forestry and of Environmental Affairs and Tourism. Members of FPAs (such as farmers and other affected parties) delineate regions and determine boundaries within which each association takes responsibility for fire fighting. The alert in this case determines the location of the fire in relation to the polygon, which is the reference point in the region: Terra, 14,5km, N, Kroonstad, 14:55 SAST

MODIS Direct Readout Station

The CSIR was able to acquire a second MODIS receiving station in March 2008 thanks to funding provided by Eskom. The new MODIS receiving station was installed on the roof of the Meraka Institute on the CSIR campus in Pretoria. Numerous products are derived from the real time data stream including, true colour images, MOD 14 active fires, MOD 09 reflectance and burned areas. The new MODIS system was acquired from Orbital Systems in the USA.