Analysis of Burning Area from Forest Fire using Sentinel-2 image: A Case Study of Pai, Mae Hong Son Province

Abstract

Forest fires are considered as a catastrophe that can cause great damage widely, some of which can occur spontaneously, or caused by human themselves, resulting in the air quality reduction. This research aims to find the risk and differentiate the specified area to assess the occurrence of forest fire in Pai district of Mae Hong Son, by using the data from Sentinel-2 Satellite between 2019 to 2020, in accordance with these indexes: Normalized Burn Ratio (NBR), Normalized Difference Water Index (NDWI) and Relativized Burn Ratio (RBR) to  classify and validate the data from the field survey and interview from the locals. The result found that the risk areas in 2020 were higher than 2019, regarding to the district level, sub-district level, conserved forest and surrounding area. Based on 2019 data, there were a burnt area 6,315.03 rai of the district level, 4,177.72 rai of the conserved forest and there were 2,071.55 Rai of the surrounding area, most burnt area at the sub-district level were in Mueng Pang while the least burnt area was Wiang Tai sub-district. Regarding 2020 data, it showed that there was 10,253.15 rai burnt area of the district level, 5,810.11 rai of the conserved forest and 4,179.42 rai of the surrounding area. The validation in this study showed that 2019 data was at 86.42%. While 2020 data was at 87.86%