Exploring the relationship between wildfire behavior and evacuation decision-making using models: a case study of the 2020 East Troublesome Fire

Keywords: wildfire; interviews; visualizations; climate change; evacuation; decision-making
Abstract Type: Paper Abstract

Abstract

Decision-making surrounding evacuation during wildfires is heavily influenced by social and environmental factors. While there has been extensive research around the role of communication during wildfire, including its timing, message content, and platform, little is known about how fire behavior and related environmental conditions affect decisions to wait, leave, or stay. Understanding how fire behavior and human behavior interact can help improve evacuation models, develop more effective emergency communication, and support the design of evacuation plans that better reflect local social and ecological contexts, among other benefits. To better understand the fire behavior-human behavior nexus, we conducted 35 interviews with 47 individuals affected by the East Troublesome Fire that burned in Grand County, Colorado during October 2020. This fire exhibited extreme behavior, which made it ideal for investigating how considerations such as wind speed and direction, smoke and broader air quality concerns, and the fire’s rate of spread, affected the timing and execution of decision-making related to evacuation. During the interviews, we introduced a series of 3D visualizations of the fire’s behavior and related weather conditions for October 21-22nd, when fire behavior and related social impacts from the fire were most intense. Visualizations were developed from fire and weather model data in partnership with the National Center for Atmospheric Research. We will present a timeline of the fire’s behavior paired with common behaviors that were triggered by each notable environmental cue. We conclude with recommendations for incorporating social responses to fire behavior into community hazard planning under climate change.