Time-clustering investigation of fire temporal fluctuations in Portugal

Abstract

Temporal clustering structures were identified and quantified in fire sequences recorded from 1980 to 2005 in Continental Portugal, by using the Allan Factor statistics, a statistical tool suited to reveal clustering behaviour in point processes. The obtained results show the presence of daily and annual periodicities, superimposed onto a scaling behaviour, which features the sequence of wildfires as a fractal time process with a rather high degree of time-clusterization of the events.