DOE OSTI · 3012085
Multi-ignition fire complexes drive extreme fire years and impacts
Abstract
Climate change is intensifying fire behavior, with the largest and fastest-spreading fires causing the greatest impacts on people and ecosystems. Yet the mechanisms driving variability and trends in large fires remain poorly understood. Using 12-hour satellite-derived fire tracking data from 2012 to 2023, we show that the merging of separate ignitions into multi-ignition complexes is a key process amplifying fire size and destructive potential across temperate and boreal ecoregions. Multi-ignition fires account for 31% of the burned area in California and 59% in the Arctic-boreal domain, spread faster and persist longer than single-ignition fires, and disproportionately contribute to extreme fire years in California, Canada, and Siberia. They also generate stronger atmospheric feedbacks, produce more pyrocumulonimbus events, and strain firefighting capacity by dispersing suppression resources. Recognizing and accounting for fire-merging dynamics are critical for improving wildfire prediction, risk assessment, and management.
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Scholten, Rebecca C. [Univ. of California, Irvine, CA (United States)] (ORCID:0000000201440572), Banerjee, Tirtha [Univ. of California, Irvine, CA (United States)] (ORCID:0000000251539474), Chen, Yang [Univ. of California, Irvine, CA (United States)] (ORCID:0000000209937081), Delgado, Andrea [Univ. of California, Irvine, CA (United States)] (ORCID:0009000506599258), Desai, Ajinkya [Univ. of California, Irvine, CA (United States)] (ORCID:0000000156424193), Ke, Ziming [Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States); Desert Research Institute (DRI), Reno, NV (United States)] (ORCID:0000000299669673), Liu, Tianjia [Univ. of California, Irvine, CA (United States); Univ. of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC (Canada)] (ORCID:0000000331290154), Morton, Douglas C. [NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC), Greenbelt, MD (United States); Univ. of Maryland, College Park, MD (United States)] (ORCID:0000000322261124), Peterson, David A. [U.S. Naval Research Laboratory, (NRL), Monterey, CA (United States)] (ORCID:0000000290273779), Tang, Qi [Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States)] (ORCID:0000000329590203), Veraverbeke, Sander [Vrije Univ., Amsterdam (Netherlands); Univ. of East Anglia, Norwich (United Kingdom)] (ORCID:0000000313625125), Zhang, Jishi [Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States)] (ORCID:0000000323565074), Randerson, James T. [Univ. of California, Irvine, CA (United States)] (ORCID:0000000165597387). 2026-01-02. Multi-ignition fire complexes drive extreme fire years and impacts. https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.adx6477
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