Above left: High hazard around Waikoloa Village with untreated fuels (hazardous vegetation).
Above right: Buffer of treated fuels around village reduces hazard. Buffer surrounds existing village and anticipated footprint (build out) of the village in the future. To reduce fire hazard to the existing village, a buffer closer to Waikoloa would need to be established.
Wildfire Hazard Potential Modeling
HWMO worked with the Pacific Disaster Center (PDC) to refine a wildfire hazard potential model developed by the PDC. We created fuels maps for inputs into the model and worked with their programmer to expand the model to include production (mass loading) data. The model is a helpful tool to identify risks to communities and asses the effectiveness of various mitigation measures.
The images show two different model outputs for the Waikoloa Village area in Kohala. The first run, with no mitigation around the village, shows a high potential for fire hazard. The second run included a buffer in which the hazardous fuels had been treated around the existing village and the anticipated footprint (build out) of the village in the future. The second run shows that the buffer reduces the hazard around the village.