Performance measures for forest fire management organizations: Evaluating and enhancing initial attack operations in the province of Alberta's Boreal Natural Region

Evaluating options, making informed decisions, measuring performance, and achieving management objectives in forest fire management organizations (FFMO) requires the development and application of measures that reflect how an organization has managed challenges presented. This thesis makes use of historical fire records from 1961--2008 to assess the impact of weather and management interventions on fire suppression effectiveness and annual area burned (AAB) within Alberta's Boreal Natural Region. Statistical models relating AAB to variations in the proportion of extreme fire behaviour potential days suggest a significant portion of inter-annual variation in AAB (82%) can be explained by the proportion of days when the Build-Up Index exceeds its 95th percentile. Probability of containment and large fire occurrence models are also developed that provide the framework for a new approach to presuppression planning in Alberta that can account for factors significantly influencing fire occurrence and containment outcome.