Hmm... I guess this problem is similar to the allocation of frequencies in a cellular network of basestations, except that the shapes of the cellular "cells" are somewhat weird. In a cellular network, you want to minimize interference, so you want to keep the cells using the same frequency (fire at the same time) as far apart as possible. Only in the forest fire case, you don't have financial pressure from the FCC auctions to minimize the number of frequencies. Of course the shapes of "cells" in the forest fire case would be distorted by prevailing winds, mountain passes, rivers, etc. At 02:18 PM 1/19/2004, Richard Guy wrote:
I'd vote for a hexagonal tiling with a 7-coloring. R.
On Mon, 19 Jan 2004, Henry Baker wrote:
They certainly haven't been doing it here in California, nor in Colorado, Wyoming, New Mexico, etc. Where are they doing this?
BTW, if this has been done before, what kinds of tilings have been suggested?
At 01:24 PM 1/19/2004, Jud McCranie wrote:
At 03:57 PM 1/19/2004, Henry Baker wrote:
It now appears that a proper way to deal with forest fires might be to lay out a geometric grid pattern of some type, color it with 6-8 colors, and then burn the part of the forest of that color each 6-8 years _on purpose_. If properly laid out, the burns of previous years would be natural firebreaks, and by burning on a shorter schedule, it wouldn't be possible to build up enough fuel to get the temperatures so hot as to kill all the larger trees -- e.g., the sequoias. Such smaller, cooler burns also recover much faster --
It "now appears"? Foresters have been doing that for at least 40-50 years.