The High Park in Northern Colorado burned over 35,000 ha and was defined as a worst-case scenario fire due to the extent, severity, and duration of the fire. This RAPID award will provide funds to document the impact of the High Park fire on the forests, soils and geomorphology of the burned area using NEON's Airborne Observatory (AOP) remotely sensed data (visible-to-shortwave infrared imaging spectrometer, small footprint waveform lidar, and high resolution digital camera) over the area disturbed by the fire and adjacent unburned areas. The remote sensing data acquisition will be coordinated with a targeted field campaign to collect baseline information on forest composition, structure and three-dimensional distribution, soil biota, and rates of erosion and sedimentation. This is an unprecedented opportunity to use this new research tool to quantify an ecological episodic event of this magnitude. Because this is a rapid response proposal, the focus is on essential data collection to characterize post-fire conditions, but data collection efforts are designed in the context of two broad categories of science questions for future research: 1. How did conditions prior to the fire affect fire behavior and impacts? and 2. How does fire severity and pattern affect post-fire trajectories? This RAPID award provides funds to gather data in response to this natural disaster; its urgency derives from the high probability that conditions on the ground will change rapidly after the fire. Summer rains will initiate post-fire erosion and sedimentation; management activities will alter the landscape characteristics, and vegetation will begin to regenerate. The intellectual merit derives from both the science questions but also the ability gather topographic, geomorphic, biological, and chemical information on unprecedented scales (cm to km) with the AOP. Combining the field and remote sensing datasets will allow an unprecedented assessment of the impact of the fire, provide data products useful to the scientific and management communities, and support future research on post-fire trajectories. Findings from this research will be of significant interest to multiple stakeholders in the region, including the US and State Forest Service and the Cities of Fort Collins and Greeley, who both have water supplies that will be affected by post-fire erosion. A workshop will be held to coordinate research results with stakeholders and transfer data products and knowledge gained in addressing complex feedbacks between drought, fire, and water supply.
The objective for this project was to respond rapidly to the High Park fire. Our goal was to obtain a remote sensing dataset of post-fire conditions shortly after the fire occurrence and before any substantial landscape changes such as erosion or sedimentation in waterways occurred as a result of summer thunderstorms. The High Park fire took place in June-July 2012 and burned over 35,000 ha of public and private lands located west and north of Fort Collins, CO. At the time, it was the second largest wildfire in Colorado history. More than 250 structures were destroyed and one fatality was reported. The fire was managed by a Type 1 incident command structure with over 1,800 fire-fighting personnel and fighting the fire cost over $31.5 million. The High Park fire was a unique opportunity to test out and demonstrate NEON’s rapid response capability to a major ecological disturbance event. The High Park fire occurred in relatively close proximity to NEON Facilities in Boulder, CO, which facilitated rapid deployment of the AOP and strong collaboration between NEON and the research community at Colorado State University. Aerial remote sensing was critical for this response, since collection of multiple post-fire response variables over such a wide area using only field data would be time consuming and prohibitively expensive. Fortunately many aspects of forest composition and structure and post-fire conditions are strongly linked to information that can be captured using remote sensing (e.g. burn severity, presence and intensity of beetle damage, tree species composition, woody biomass, terrain elevation). NEON flew the first of its Airborne Observation Platform (AOP) remote sensing platforms in this campaign with a goal of surveying the entire High Park burn scar. The NEON AOP is an integrated airborne system developed specifically for monitoring terrestrial ecosystems. It incorporates a high-fidelity visible-to-shortwave infrared (VSWIR) imaging spectrometer operating from 380 to 2500 nm, a small footprint waveform lidar, and a high resolution digital camera. For this campaign, the NEON Imaging Spectrometer Design Verification Unit (NISDVU) was flown. The airborne lidar provides a high resolution digital elevation model of the post-burn topography to better than 25 cm accuracy in both horizontal and vertical directions as well as mapping the three-dimensional distribution of burned and unburned vegetation. Images collected by the imaging spectrometer can used to produce maps of the remaining beetle-infested and beetle-kill areas, tree species composition, invasive species presence, and initial maps of burn severity. Flight operations began on October 29, 2012 and were completed on October 31, 2013. A total of 70 lines and cross strips were flown. These extended over the entire burn scar (see supplementary material) including Ponderosa pine forests in the eastern portion to Lodgepole Pine-dominated forests at higher elevations. Mean flight altitudes ranged between 10,600 ft. and 13,300 ft. altitude above Mean Sea Level (MSL). On October 29, 2012, a total of 20 flight lines and one cross strip were flown. These were located in the central portion of the burn scar. Flight lines flown are shown in the attached Supplementary information. Our initial deployment was to the westernmost section (highest elevation) section, but winds were quite severe at these altitudes, so we shifted down to lower elevations. Weather was favorable for flying with limited cloud cover. Even at these mid-range altitudes, some snow remained on north facing slopes and shaded regions. A total of 25 lines were flown on October 30, 2012 over the lower elevation areas nearest to the city of Fort Collins. The flight this day was four hours in length. On October 31, the remaining portions of the High Park Fire burn scar were flown. Weather was excellent with clear skies and only some high cirrus clouds. The westernmost (i.e., higher elevation portion of the burn scar) was surveyed and fortunately, winds were much less in this region than the preceding days. A complete survey of the High Park Fire burn scar was completed and a full set of imaging spectrometer, LiDAR, and digital imagery was collected over the full region surveyed. The remote sensing data sets from this project will be freely shared with the scientific community under the terms of the NEON data sharing policy and are being made available on the NEON website (www.neoninc.org/). Data and findings from this study are of significant interest to many stakeholders in the region, including the US and State Forest Service, Larimer County, and the Cities of Fort Collins and Greeley, both of whom have water supply systems likely to be affected by post-fire erosion.
