Miguel G. Cruz

The Balbi operational model, a simplified physical model for surface fires spread. Part II – model parameterisation and evaluation

Background The ‘Balbi model’ is a simplified physical model for surface fires which provides the main physical characteristics of a fire front and its rate of spread (ROS) as a function of general environmental conditions. In the first part of this work, we describe a simplificat...

The Balbi operational model, a simplified physical model for surface fires. Part I – modelling

Background Previously published versions of the ‘Balbi model’ describing surface fire propagation consist of a set of equations based on simplified conservation laws. Their main equation calculating the fire rate of spread (ROS) relied on an iterative process to account for the e...