UAV-based system for real-time wildfire perimeter propagation tracking

Abstract

Real-time wildfire perimeter tracking provides situational awareness and enhances decision-making during firefighting. This paper proposes a UAV-based system that integrates real-time data collection (using onboard sensors) into a fire propagation model to provide accurate state information on the wildfire perimeter and improve fire prediction. Firstly, a data fusion scheme is devised to employ available historical data in combination with real-time measurements to provide updated inputs to the fire propagation model. Then the model is used to predict the future fire perimeter and uses these predictions to guide the UAV to track the fire perimeter better. The proposed system is evaluated in extensive simulation experiments, demonstrating its effectiveness for real-time wildfire perimeter propagation tracking.