Forest Fire Variability Over the Central India Region from 2001–2020

Large-scale, frequent forest fires have a detrimental effect on the environment, the quality of the air, and human health. In the present study, from 2001 to 2020, March (1,857.5 counts/month) and April (922.8 counts/month) saw around 70% of the region's annual forest fires. Unusually high numbers of forest fires have been reported in some years, including 2009, 2012, and 2017. A thorough investigation is conducted into the contribution of numerous climate extremes and persistently rising temperatures to the rise in forest fire activity over central India. Forest fire activity doubled and tripled during the non-fire (July–January) and forest fire (February–June) seasons, respectively, over the warmer period from 2006 to 2020. A severe heat wave, an unusual drought, and an exceptionally powerful El Nino occurred in central India between 2015 JASONDJ and 2018 FMAMJ. These events are thought to have contributed to an upsurge in forest fires. The quinquennial spatiotemporal changes in forest fire characteristics, including average fire intensity and fire count density, were also evaluated. Significantly high soil temperature, low soil moisture content, poor evapotranspiration, and low normalized difference vegetation index are statistically associated with high near-surface air temperature and low precipitation during FMAMJ. This makes the climate much drier, which encourages a lot of forest fires in the Central Indian region.