Wind field interpolation over complex terrain and its application in the simulation of forest fire spreading.

Speed and direction of wind change over complex terrain in mountain areas.As a major factor affecting the spread of forest fires,the accuracy of wind field data directly affects the prediction of forest fire spreading in mountain areas.We developed a new method of interpolation of the wind field which takes both topographic relief and distance as weighting factors into consideration.Compared with the traditional IDW interpolation method based on spatial distance,our verified results show that the wind field interpolated by this new method is closer to actual conditions and the simulation of forest fire spreading with the interpolated wind field data is more similar both in fire shape and burned area.