InciWeb is an interagency all-

risk In simple terms, risk is the possibility of something bad happening. Risk involves uncertainty about the effects/implications of an activity with respect to something that humans value (such as health, well-being, wealth, property or the environme ...

incident web information management system provided by the

United States Forest Service The United States Forest Service (USFS) is an agency of the U.S. Department of Agriculture that administers the nation's 154 national forests and 20 national grasslands. The Forest Service manages of land. Major divisions of the agency inc ...

released in 2004. It was originally developed for

wildland fire A wildfire, forest fire, bushfire, wildland fire or rural fire is an unplanned, uncontrolled and unpredictable fire in an area of combustible vegetation. Depending on the type of vegetation present, a wildfire may be more specifically identif ...

emergencies, but can be also used for other

emergency An emergency is an urgent, unexpected, and usually dangerous situation that poses an immediate risk to health, life, property, or environment and requires immediate action. Most emergencies require urgent intervention to prevent a worsening ...

incidents (

natural disaster A natural disaster is "the negative impact following an actual occurrence of natural hazard in the event that it significantly harms a community". A natural disaster can cause loss of life or damage property, and typically leaves some econ ...

s, such as

earthquake An earthquake (also known as a quake, tremor or temblor) is the shaking of the surface of the Earth resulting from a sudden release of energy in the Earth's lithosphere that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes can range in intensity, from ...

flood A flood is an overflow of water ( or rarely other fluids) that submerges land that is usually dry. In the sense of "flowing water", the word may also be applied to the inflow of the tide. Floods are an area of study of the discipline hydrol ...

hurricane A tropical cyclone is a rapidly rotating storm system characterized by a low-pressure center, a closed low-level atmospheric circulation, strong winds, and a spiral arrangement of thunderstorms that produce heavy rain and squalls. Depend ...

s, and

tornado A tornado is a violently rotating column of air that is in contact with both the surface of the Earth and a cumulonimbus cloud or, in rare cases, the base of a cumulus cloud. It is often referred to as a twister, whirlwind or cyclone, altho ...

es).

Introduction

It was developed with two primary missions: * 1. Provide the public a single source of incident related information * 2. Provide a standardized reporting tool for the Public Affairs community Official announcements include evacuations, road closures, news releases, maps, photographs, and basic info and current situation about the incident. Incident information can be accessed by: * web browser at http://inciweb.nwcg.gov *

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

RSS RSS ( RDF Site Summary or Really Simple Syndication) is a web feed that allows users and applications to access updates to websites in a standardized, computer-readable format. Subscribing to RSS feeds can allow a user to keep track of many di ...

web feed

Technical

The original application was hosted at the

- Wildland Fire Training and Conference Center, at

McClellan Airfield Sacramento McClellan Airport is a privately owned public-use airport located six miles (10 km) northeast of the central business district of Sacramento, California, Sacramento (a city in Sacramento County, California, Sacramento County, ...

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

, comprising three

server Server may refer to: Computing *Server (computing), a computer program or a device that provides functionality for other programs or devices, called clients Role * Waiting staff, those who work at a restaurant or a bar attending customers and su ...

s: *

Database server A database server is a server which uses a database application that provides database services to other computer programs or to computers, as defined by the client–server model. Database management systems (DBMSs) frequently provide database-s ...

* Administrative server *

Load balancer In computing, load balancing is the process of distributing a set of tasks over a set of resources (computing units), with the aim of making their overall processing more efficient. Load balancing can optimize the response time and avoid unevenl ...

for the public content which routes traffic to a pool of eight servers.

Web traffic Web traffic is the data sent and received by visitors to a website. Since the mid-1990s, web traffic has been the largest portion of Internet traffic. Sites monitor the incoming and outgoing traffic to see which parts or pages of their site are ...

averages 2 million plus hits daily during the fire season with the ability to handle 3.5 million hits. The servers were moved to the National information Technology Center (NITC),

Kansas City, Missouri Kansas City (abbreviated KC or KCMO) is the largest city in Missouri by population and area. As of the 2020 census, the city had a population of 508,090 in 2020, making it the 36th most-populous city in the United States. It is the central ...

on July 16, 2008, along with the release of version 2.0; the current version is 2.2.

Availability issues

InciWeb was having technical difficulties due to the high volume of Internet users trying to access the site during the September–October 2006

Day Fire The Day Fire was a devastating wildfire that burned of land in the Topatopa Mountains, within the Los Padres National Forest in Ventura County, southern California. History The fire, which was the largest of the 2006 California wildfire season ...

and the

Summer 2008 California wildfires The 2008 California wildfire season was one of the most devastating in the state of the 21st century. While 6,255 fires occurred, about two-thirds as many as in 2007, the total area burned— —far exceeded that of previous years. By July 5, 2008 ...

.InciWeb Problems Are Bull…
June–July 2008. W.I.S.E. Fire Tracking, Western Institute for Study of the Environment. Retrieved 2009-09-02.

Participating agencies

Bureau of Land Management The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is an agency within the United States Department of the Interior responsible for administering federal lands. Headquartered in Washington DC, and with oversight over , it governs one eighth of the country's la ...

Bureau of Indian Affairs The Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA), also known as Indian Affairs (IA), is a United States federal agency within the Department of the Interior. It is responsible for implementing federal laws and policies related to American Indians and A ...

Fish and Wildlife Service The United States Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS or FWS) is an agency within the United States Department of the Interior dedicated to the management of fish, wildlife, and natural habitats. The mission of the agency is "working with othe ...

National Park Service The National Park Service (NPS) is an agency of the United States federal government within the U.S. Department of the Interior that manages all national parks, most national monuments, and other natural, historical, and recreational propertie ...

National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (abbreviated as NOAA ) is an United States scientific and regulatory agency within the United States Department of Commerce that forecasts weather, monitors oceanic and atmospheric conditio ...

Department of the Interior The United States Department of the Interior (DOI) is one of the executive departments of the U.S. federal government headquartered at the Main Interior Building, located at 1849 C Street NW in Washington, D.C. It is responsible for the mana ...

Office of Aircraft Services *

National Association of State Foresters The National Association of State Foresters (NASF) is a non-profit organization that represents the directors of the 50 state forestry agencies, eight United States territories, and the District of Columbia. State foresters manage and protect state ...

United States Fire Administration The United States Fire Administration (USFA) is a division of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) located in unincorporated Frederick County, Maryland, near Emmitsburg. Per the official website, "the mission of the U.S. Fire Administra ...

These same agencies are also in the

National Interagency Fire Center The National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC) in Boise, Idaho is the physical facility which is the home to the National Interagency Coordination Center (NICC), and the National Multi-Agency Coordination group (NMAC or MAC). The center works clo ...

References

{{reflist

External links

Inciweb official website
* Judith L. Downing, Ronald W. Hodgson, Jonathan G. Taylor, and Shana C. Gillette. Fire Information for Communities at Risk in Interface Wildfires: Lessons Learned From the 2003 Southern California Megafires. pages 135-152 i
Fire Social Science Research From the Pacific Southwest Research Station: Studies Supported by National Fire Plan Funds
August 2008.

. InciWeb is mentioned on page 139, footnote 11. 2004 establishments in the United States Wildfires Web applications Incident management Disaster preparedness in the United States Firefighting in the United States Management systems Emergency management software