In emergency situations like forest fires, satellites can help save lives and property by providing data allowing for timely warning of impending dangers so the local population can be evacuated.

EUMETSAT has produced a fire radiative power estimation algorithm based on data from the Spinning Enhanced Visible and Infrared Imager (SEVIRI) instrument on Meteosat-8/9 which will soon be available on the EUMETSAT website. An (MPEG, 3 MB / 5 Aug 2007 at 11:45 - 16:45 UTC) showing the Dubrovnik fires is included with this story.

Vlasta Tutis, assistant to the director of the Meteorological and Hydrological Service of Croatia, said: “The fire is diminishing at the moment but another is coming from north of Dubrovnik.” She added that the anti-cyclonic bora of the last few days had also gone. The American Meteorological Society’s Glossary of Meteorology defines an anti-cyclonic bora as a powerful anti-cyclone (rotating clockwise in the northern hemisphere, unlike a cyclone) in central Europe extending over Dalmatia. It is very violent over land but extends only a short distance out to sea.

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