Governor Gianforte Launches new Montana Wildfire Dashboard
You can’t tell one wildfire from another without a scorecard, or in this case, a dashboard.
This week, Governor Greg Gianforte’s staff launched a new online dashboard so that everyone can see exactly how many fires are burning in the state, where and for how long.
Fire Information Officer Kristin Sleeper with the Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation provided details of the new tool for Montanans.
“Today we're happy to announce the launch of our new wildland fire incident dashboard,” said Sleeper. “It can be found at mt fire info dot org and is a way for Montanans and wildland fire professionals to get a glimpse of the statewide picture. You're going to be able to find information like the number of active wildfires, the number of wildfires to date so far this year, and the total number of acres burned and it's going to be updated in real time.”
Sleeper said you’ll receive up to the minute updates on every fire as they are reported to INCI Web.
“You're going to be able to see that the last update was pushed one or two minutes ago, really putting timely, accurate fire information in the hands of all Montanans,” she said. “I do like to call attention to that this, we see this dashboard as being used in compliment with INCI web, which is typically where you go for information on active large fire. You're not going to be able to get as much information as you can get off of INCI web, but this is where you can go to get a quick snapshot and learn about new starts or emerging incidents as they happen in real time.”
Sleeper praised the agencies involved in creating the new dashboard.
“Across Montana, we're noticing that we saw some significant conditions in the month of July typically, conditions that we normally see in August, we were seeing in July. And with this administration, we've just been working really hard to make sure we have the best information available. And currently, there was no place where you could get this Montana specific data. You could get data for the Northern Rockies, which includes Idaho, North Dakota, and a small segment of South Dakota, but this is really the only real time Montana dashboard that exists for wildland fire.”
Sleeper said the dashboard will remain up year-round and then be reset at the start of each new fire season.
“We imagine this being up year round,” she said. “Once we hit January of next year, the total will go back to zero, and we'll start again. It's going to be sort of our 365 day picture of what our wildland fire year really looks like in Montana, so we're excited to have this resource at our disposal.”
Click here to see the new dashboard at any time.
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