Skip to main content
Author(s):
Carmen Quintano, Alfonso Fernández-Manso, Dar A. Roberts
Year Published:

Cataloging Information

Topic(s):
Fire Effects
Mapping

NRFSN number: 21929
FRAMES RCS number: 23142
Record updated:

Forest fires are incidents of great importance in Mediterranean environments. Landsat data have proven to be suitable for evaluating post-fire vegetation damage and determining different levels of burn severity, which is crucial for planning post-fire rehabilitation. This study assessed the utility of combined Multiple Endmember Spectral Mixture Analysis (MESMA) fraction images and Land Surface Temperature (LST) to accurately map burn severity. We studied a large convection-dominated wildfire, which occurred on 19-21 September 2012 in Spain, in a zone dominated by Pinus pinaster Ait. Burn severity degree (low, moderate, and high) was measured 2-3 months after fire in 111 field plots using the Composite Burn Index (CBI). Four fraction images were generated using MESMA from the reflective bands of a post-fire Landsat 7 Enhanced Thematic Mapper (ETM +) image: 1.-char, 2.-green vegetation (GV), 3.-non-photosynthetic vegetation and soil (NPVS) and 4.-shade. The thermal band was converted to LST using a single channel algorithm. Next, Multinomial Logistic Regression (MLR) was used to obtain the probability of each burn severity level from MESMA fraction images and LST. Finally, a burn severity map was generated from the probability images and independently validated using an error matrix, producer and user accuracies per class, and κ statistic. MLR identified the char fraction image and LST as the only significant explanatory variables when burn severity acted as the response variable. Two burn severity degrees (low-moderate and high) were finally considered to build the final burn severity map. In this way, we reached a higher accuracy (κ = 0.79) than using the original three burn severity levels (κ = 0.66). Our study demonstrates the validity of combining fraction images and LST from Landsat data to map burn severity accurately in Mediterranean countries.

Citation

Quintano, Carmen; Fernandez-Manso, Alfonso; Roberts, Dar A. 2017. Burn severity mapping from Landsat MESMA fraction images and land surface temperature. Remote Sensing of Environment 190:83-95. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rse.2016.12.009

Access this Document

Treesearch

publication access with no paywall

Check to see if this document is available for free in the USDA Forest Service Treesearch collection of publications. The collection includes peer reviewed publications in scientific journals, books, conference proceedings, and reports produced by Forest Service employees, as well as science synthesis publications and other products from Forest Service Research Stations.