Dr. Luigi Boschetti recognized for work on joint NOAA-NASA fire project

Congratulations to Dr. Luigi Boschetti, Professor of Remote Sensing in the Department of Forest, Rangeland and Fire Sciences on receiving a NASA Group Achievement Award for his participation in the 2019 FIREX-AQ campaign.  While the award was approved in 2020, notification of the award was delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Fire Influence on Regional to Global Environments and Air Quality, or FIREX-AQ campaign, was a joint venture between NOAA and NASA focused on investigating wildfire smoke. A major goal of FIREX-AQ was to combine near and far-field observations to understand emissions, chemical evolution, transport and evaluate downwind impacts of wildfires in coordination with interagency partners.  As fires increasingly occur in North America and affect the human and natural environment, FIREX-AQ for the first time comprehensively enabled bridging the local to continental scale to improve our understanding of how smoke from fires affects air quality. 

Utilizing NASA’s DC-8 flying laboratory, two NOAA Twin Otter aircraft platforms, and NASA’s ER-2 high-altitude research aircraft, the FIREX-AQ campaign investigated fire weather conditions and nighttime smoke chemistry at the regional and local scale in the northwestern U.S.  Additionally, the aircraft worked with diverse ground-based operations in Idaho and across the Pacific Northwest to provide continuous, surface-based measurements to complement the periodic airborne data collected from the airborne platforms.  In this way, the mobile, ground-based platforms measured smoke at lower altitudes where it matters most to human health.

The campaign was complex and included scientists from six federal agencies, 22 universities, two foreign governments, and a variety of private sector companies.

Dr. Boschetti’s role in the FIREX-AQ campaign was focused on successful efforts to install and manage a network of sun-photometers along an elevational gradient in the Frank Church River-of-No-Return Wilderness near UI’s Taylor Wilderness Research Station.  Also recognized was Peter Gag, former manager of the College of Natural Resources’ Taylor Ranch.   

To learn more about the FIREX-AQ campaign, visit the FIREX-AQ website:
https://csl.noaa.gov/projects/firex-aq/about/

Article by Charles Goebel, Department of Forest, Rangeland and Fire Sciences

Published October 2023