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191 people, destroyed 12,000 homes, and forced 56,000 people to flee. In February 1967, the "Black Tuesday" fire in Tasmania, Australia, burned more than 260 square kilometers (tOO square miles), destroying more than 2,000 struc- tures, killing 50,000 sheep, and consuming more than 5 percent of the pasture land in the state. Earlier, a series of brush fires in Ghana in 1983 destroyed 35 percent - 154,000 metric tons - of the country's standing crops and stored cereal. Earthquake-induced fires are typified by the San Francisco fire in 1906 and the Tokyo fire in 1923. Both fires consumed substantial portions of the cities. Much can be done to prevent, control, and mitigate wildfire and its effects. Prevention, of course, is the first line of attack. It is sometimes feasible to modify vegetative fuels and reduce the severity of fire hazard. Controlled burning, thin- ning vegetation or replacing it with more fire- resistent species, and creating voids or breaks in large expanses of natural fuels are all ways to deprive fires of fuel. Prevention has its human side as well. Public education activities, such as those that famil- iarized the U.S. population with Smokey the Bear's popular message, "Remember, only you can prevent forest fires," are effective in creating an awareness of the need to be careful with fire. The message is significant, considering that peo- ple cause a substantial number of wildfires. Improvement in both firefighter training and equipment also yields rich dividends, In some countries, such as the United States, much has been done to prepare firefighters and their organi- zations to respond quickly and effectively. Else- where, the application of existing basic fire sup- pression technology could greatly reduce the destruction of wildfires. In all countries, there is considerable room for improving fire fighting ca- pability in wildland/urban interface situations. For example, most U.S. firefighters are trained and equipped to fight either wildland or structural fires - not both. The construction, design, and composition of a structure influence the probability of its surviving a wildfire threat. Wood shingle roofs become highly flammable; fiberglass skylights and attic vents melt, permitting embers to enter a building; open-furred roofing (as with Spanish tile) also lets embers in; and un shuttered glass windows blow out from heat stress. All these hazardous condi- 45 tions can be addressed with low-technology solu- tions. Actions taken after a fire can also mitigate the severity of both the short- and long-term impacts. On large burns, planting grass seed or other ground cover reduces soil erosion. Erosion can also be controlled with structural and earthen barriers to retard surface runoff. Many advances have been made in understand- ing the physical and biological relationships of wildfire control and prevention. But the social aspects of wildland/urban interface areas still present many difficulties. Solutions require a better understanding of how to change behavior in the face of increasing fire risk or how to adapt fire protection to behavior patterns. Many measures for mitigating other natural hazards can be applied to the wildland fires, including retrofitting, disaster relief, modification of existing uses, and postdisaster planning. Potential projects during the IDNHR include: . determination of the distribution of the wild- land/urban interface and monitoring of its fire- related trends, such as housing design, materials, and placement; ~ refinement of the understanding of fire physics and the expected behavior of large fires, particu- larly as they relate to the wildland/urban inter- face; ~ development of models for evaluating the risks of individual community designs and struc- tures; ~ initiation of an international program to exchange knowledge of fire suppression tech- niques and fire effects and identification of knowl- edge gaps unique to individual regions; ~ improvement of fire-resistant construction materials, systems, and standards; ~ study of how to manage wildfire smoke to eliminate health hazards and the negative effects on air corridors and transportation networks; ~ research on the relationship of fire to des- ertification, climate change, and biodiversity; ~ development of long-range weather forecast- ing procedures keyed to predictions of fire sever- ity; ~ improvement of the ability to communicate the economic consequences of fire hazard mitiga- tion activities and to assess the economic tradeoffs among the hazard reduction strategies; ~ characterization of homeowners, builders,