Aurora

Kuching | Take Flight: Making the Most of NASA’s Airborne Data

AGROBLAZE

High-Level Project Summary

Over the last century, prescribed fire has been a famous land management method as it is fast, efficient, beneficial and economical. However, the lack of information required to plan, schedule, and conduct prescribed fire had caused uncontrolled implementation. Introducing AgroBlaze, a mobile application that has accessible and easy visualization functioning features including daily fire smoke detection, air quality map, estimation of the burning time and fuel loads from FIREX-AQ data, and daily rain and snow precipitation data from OLYMPEX which has been simplified with a user-friendly interface so that it can be understood by the target users

Link to Final Project

https://youtu.be/ja2-Kpzivg0

Link to Project "Demo"

https://youtu.be/69XxvMQpIVo

Detailed Project Description

What does AgroBlaze do?

Our mobile application utilizes NASA’s FIREX-AQ and OLYMPEX data that have been simplified in visualization and presented in a way that is easily accessible and understood by the public. This application is very useful for the public, specific individuals in the agricultural sector such as land managers and crop farmers, as the data provide information on daily fire smoke detection, air quality map, estimation of the burning time and fuel loads, and daily rain and snow precipitation which are essential factors to consider when planning prescribed fires.

How does it work?

Firstly, when the user enters the app, they will be at the HOME page which shows the user’s location automatically and the option between our two main features which are Forecast Weather or Prescribed Fire for the user to choose.

Secondly, when selecting the first option, it will show the Forecast Weather page. This page is actually a Next Step plan for this project so it does not yet have the proper functions and dataset from OLYMPEX data. We are considering using the GPM Ground Validation Daily Precipitation for the daily rain and snow precipitation function in an easy-to-understand visual.

Thirdly, when the user clicks the second option, it will display the Prescribed Fire page. The user has to choose the location and time to estimate the right and accurate estimation of burning time and fuel loads when planning to prescribe the fire. This page includes most of the main functions in this app which use the data from FIREX-AQ:

Daily fire smoke detection: Alert the users that there is also another burning happening at the chosen time so the system will not recommend the user to do the burning at that time.
Air quality map: If the air quality at that place is already bad, the system will alert the user not to do the burning.
Estimation of the burning time and fuel loads: After choosing the time and location to do the prescribed fire, the system will retrieve all the datasets influencing this decision which are the rain and snowfall precipitation, air quality, and fire smoke to determine the estimation of burning time and the fuel loads used for the prescribed fires.

Most of these functions are not yet included in the datasets. In Next Plan, we want to further analyze these data to provide more helpful information for the users.

Benefit of AgroBlaze

We envisioned that this app would be used by land managers in the agricultural sector to allow them to have access to this valuable data with ease and that they may utilize it in the planning of prescribed fires. This is vital in the prevention of wildfire occurrence as wildfire causes negative impacts like the destruction of property and crops which may have an impact on regional food security. On an even bigger scale, we envisioned AgroBlaze would indirectly reduce climate change with the reduction of wildfire as wildfire contributes to climate change by increasing the carbon dioxide percentage in the atmosphere.

OUR 240S OF GLORY

Video link: https://youtu.be/5SHTRjfBYDk

Future Hopes of AgroBlaze

The future of AgroBlaze is infinite! We intend to make these useful facts and statistics that NASA has supplied to the public easily available, especially to agricultural industries like land management and crop farming. We also wish to build a user-friendly mobile application related to the data from OLYMPEX and FIREX-AQ. The essential goal of our mobile application is to encourage people of all ages in agricultural industries to control the prescribed fires by giving them a comprehensive grasp of a one-stop application to reduce its effect on climate change. While it is a small step, we believe that it will have a big positive impact on a more sustainable future. Lastly, we hope to raise awareness of implementing control prescribed fire as well as reducing its effect on climate change.

Next Step of AgroBlaze

In the future, we plan to do further research and analyze the data to provide more useful information for users which includes:

OLYMPEX GPM Ground Validation Daily Precipitation for the daily rain and snow precipitation function in an easy-to-understand visual.
FIREX-AQ HRRR-Smoke Graphics for the daily fire smoke detection
FIREX data for estimation of the burning time, fuel loads, fire smoke transport, and air quality
Better user interface design
Recruit more agricultural enthusiasts to further the data research
Proceed to find funding, marketing, and Business Model Canvas for the business aspect

Tools

NASA FIREX-AQ & OLYMPEX – Data sources

Figma – App designing

VN – Video editing

Space Agency Data

We used data mostly from FIREX-AQ for daily fire smoke detection, air quality map, estimation of the burning time and fuel loads, and some from OLYMPEX for daily rain and snow precipitation.

Hackathon Journey

Our Experience

Our team came to be in an unexpected way with the collections of members that are familiar with each other before the hackathon and some members that joined the group through the hackathon. The team was also finalized rather late which may cause some awkwardness and communication barriers, but fortunately, that was not the case at all. While we all have different educational backgrounds, two things we all share are that we are all students in University of Malaysia, Sarawak (UNIMAS) and this hackathon is the first ever hackathon we ever joined. These two facts were all it takes for the members to connect and collaborate as a team efficiently and it surely could not get any better than this.

As expected, we do struggle and stumble with many things since we are inexperienced. We had a hard time choosing challenges, finding data, and app prototyping. Even though so, we always keep our heads up and try our best to complete our tasks. It was our good intention to contribute to the global hackathon and our love for the challenge that had kept us going until the very end.

To the mentors who assisted us, Mr. Hamuza, Mr. Lee Zhi Eng, and Teacher Teo, we thank you. We were lost in the sea of data and research, not knowing how and which to utilize, and it was they who came forth to give their professional opinion and guidance by validating our idea and action plans. Soon after, we were able to get back on track quickly and sail smoothly. To that, we are forever grateful! The experience we gained was not only thrilling, but it was also very fruitful with all the knowledge and skills we have learned along with the friend we had made. All in all, everyone had a good time working with each other for this hackathon. It is a memory worth reminiscing!

Our Inspiration

Right from the beginning, our team has always been more sided in choosing challenges that are related to climate change as we believe that climate change is a problem that requires the most attention. Therefore, we want to contribute to coming up with solutions in regard of climate change issues. When exploring this challenge, we realized that this challenge is related to our interest and that we have the skills required to complete them. Hence, we eventually decided to choose this as our challenge!

Our Approach

The members with experience in coding and programming lead the team on discussing and deciding which is the best challenge for the team.
Once the challenge is decided, we held meetings to come up with possible pathways to complete the challenge. We also discussed in detail what is the concept, objective, and solution that we have in mind for the specific problems we thought of from the challenge.
The entire team then search for data required for the project we planned. We divide and conquer with each member covering one airborne campaign to find which is best suited for our project.
When data is found, we divide it into three sub-teams: The first team oversees drafting prototypes, coding, and visual design. The second team was involved in data research, interpretation, and data representation. The third team areas responsible for clerical affairs, scriptwriting, website management, and pitch presentation preparations.
The two teams share their end of work to each other for updates and feedback to gain the best outcome while working within the limited time given.