Formalisation and Use of Experience in Forest Fires Management

This paper presents a study of the learning process in emergency management with an application to forest fire fighting. The first part presents the methodology used to determine the mental image of fire fighting management and to propose a model of representation of the individual experience gained during operations. The second part introduces a method to capitalise experience of fire management, which uses a prototype of GIS application. The third part of the article presents the different types of support that can be provided by a collective memory of individual experience and a reasoning method that includes this experience to provide several levels of support to forest fire managers. This study was undertaken in co‐operation with organisations in Canada and Spain.