Influencia de factores meteorológicos en la generación de incendios en la provincia de las Tunas.

municipalities in Las Tunas province, Cuba, in the period 2008-2012. For this purpose, 249 fires were analyzed along with the behavior of meteorological variables. There were found differences among the municipalities regarding the occurrence of fires, the areas affected and the factors related to the spreading. For the case of small fires, it was verified the relationship between meteorological variables and the area affected by fires, although the correlation values were not high. The variables with greater influence, as it was expected, were those related to the moisture of the combustible materials, to the accumulated of precipitations 15 and 20 days before each fire and the relative humidity. It was possible to group successfully the number of fires and affected area with respect to different ranges of the meteorological variables, obtaining qualitative criteria of fire risk. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]