Wildfire Ignition Potential, Santa Monica Mountains Region, CA

This dataset is a 30-m cell size raster representing predicted wildfire ignition potential based on historical (1980-2010) conditions. This model used 11 explanatory variables: Santa Ana wind speed, distance to roads, distance to development, summer precipitation, topographic wetness index, minimum temperature, topographic position, elevation, average maximum NDVI (1984-2010), distance to electric transmission lines, and southwest index. This model had a mean 10-fold cross-validated test AUC of 0.81, overall accuracy of 0.77, and TSS of 0.53.

All models are abstractions of reality that are created for particular purposes and should be used with caution. These outputs map the potential for wildfire ignition based on statistical modeling and available landscape-scale and longer-term data. They should be used solely to evaluate broad, general patterns of relative fire risk across the landscape and inform management decisions. They should not be used to predict the behavior of individual fires or to evaluate risk to structures at the parcel scale.