Scaling Collapse
Scaling collapse is one of the clearest ways to test whether many different fires share a common underlying growth process.
The basic idea
If fires are realizations of the same generative process, then after appropriate normalization their trajectories should partially overlap during the same growth regime.
For example:
- normalize time by fire duration
- normalize perimeter by a characteristic perimeter scale
Then compare the resulting curves across many events.
What success would look like
A strong result would show:
- scatter during early ignition
- overlap during a middle expansion interval
- divergence again during late-stage constraint
That pattern would support the regime-specific scaling hypothesis.
Why this matters here
Scaling collapse does more than estimate an exponent. It asks whether the same process is visible across many fires despite differences in duration, size, and context.