Post-fire debris-flow hazard model output files, Santa Fe Municipal Watershed, New Mexico

Wildfires are increasing in size and severity because of a warming climate in combination with overstocked forests. Fire increases the likelihood of debris flows, posing significant threats to life, property, and water supplies. Post-fire debris flows are a substantial, increasing hazard in the Santa Fe Municipal Watershed and other similar forested watersheds across the western United States. The Santa Fe Municipal Watershed in northern New Mexico is of vital importance to the water supply for the city of Santa Fe. We conducted a debris-flow hazard assessment for the Santa Fe Municipal Watershed (SFMW) in north-central New Mexico.  We modeled post-fire debris flow probability and volume in 103 sub-basins for 2-year, 5-year, and Probable Maximum Precipitation rainfall events following modeled low-, moderate-, and high-severity wildfires. Crown fire potential was modeled with FlamMap (Finney, 2006), after Tillery and others (2014). To satisfy data input requirements of the debris flow model that include burn severity classes (low, moderate, and high), the modeled crown fire activity was first converted to differenced Normalized Burn Ratio or dNBR (French and others, 2008). This conversion was calibrated based on burn severities from the 2011 Pacheco Fire that burned in a nearby watershed (approximately 5 km north of the SFMW). Data files are numbered 1-5.  Spatial files provided in this data release include: 1) polygon of the study area; 2) 103 sub-basins within the study area; 3) Thematic Burn Severity Mosaic for New Mexico in 2011; and 4) complete post-fire debris flow probability and volume data of every rainfall event and wildfire scenario for 103 sub-basins. Tabulated data provided in this data release include: 5) calculated burn severity percentages for Pacheco Canyon Fire.

REFERENCES CITED

Finney, M.A., 2006. An overview of FlamMap fire modeling capabilities. In: Andrews, Patricia L.; Butler, Bret W., comps. 2006. Fuels Management-How to Measure Success: Conference Proceedings. 28-30 March 2006; Portland, OR. Proceedings RMRS-P-41. Fort Collins, CO: US Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station. p. 213-220.
 

French, N.H., Kasischke, E.S., Hall, R.J., Murphy, K.A., Verbyla, D.L., Hoy, E.E., Allen, J.L., 2008. Using Landsat data to assess fire and burn severity in the North American boreal forest region: an overview and summary of results. International Journal of Wildland Fire v. 17, p. 443–462.
 

Tillery, A.C., Haas, J.R., Miller, L.W., Scott, J.H., Thompson, M.P., 2014. Potential postwildfire debris-flow hazards: a prewildfire evaluation for the Sandia and Manzano Mountains and surrounding areas, central New Mexico: U.S. Geological Survey Scientific Investigations Report 2014-5461, 24p with appendix, https://dx.doi.org/10.3133/sir20145161.