Who stops forest work when the fire danger is too high?
How do you know when to start or stop work?
We are building ForestSafe: the fire danger for each site you run, and a warning to you and your crews when it is too high for hot work. You send one alert to stop the work or start it again. You see who has seen it, the ones who have not are called, and the record shows you acted.
Name one site you run. We read it by hand, from the area forecast and open satellite data, and send you what the forecast said and what the satellite saw on that stand in its driest week last summer. Clouds permitting.
Read by hand, one site per reply, not a product. Morten answers himself within a few days. We use your email and the site only to reply to you. How we handle your email. Prefer to talk first? Book 30 minutes with Morten.
Thank you. Morten reads it himself and answers within a few days.
The problem
The forecast gives one value for a whole area. Your crews work on one site.
Fire danger forecasts are made from weather and how long it has been dry, for a standard forest, per grid square or municipality. They give one value for the whole area, not for the stand your harvester is in. The site can be drier or wetter than the forecast says.
Riskhantering avseende brand vid skogsarbete, 3rd edition, Skogforsk 2024.
Two things follow. Work that should stop sometimes continues. And where the area forecast is what stops the work, the sites that got rain stop with the rest.
The first is your risk. The second is your stopped day.
The concept
Fire danger for your site. One alert to your crew. A record of both.
Varsko's alarm, acknowledgement, escalation and log run today. The zone, the fire danger for each site, and the one alert to everyone in the zone are what we are building.
Fire danger per site
A zone around each site you run. The fire danger forecast for the area, and what the Copernicus satellites last saw of the stand: vegetation and moisture. Anyone who enters the zone gets the warning on their phone.
You stop the work with one alert
You send it once, to stop the work or to start it again. Everyone in the zone gets it and acknowledges. You see who has seen it and who has not. ForestSafe calls those who have not. The event log keeps every alert and every acknowledgement, with the time.
The lone-worker alarm
Everyone in the zone also carries it. If something happens to an operator alone on the site, the alarm is sent to the crew and to the people they chose, with the operator's position while it is active, and escalated to the next person when no one answers. You can be one of them. Check-in and automatic detection are not built yet.
Not a new risk map, and not a new forecast. The signal for the site, the alert to the crew, and the record of both. Position goes to the crew during an alarm, not through the day.
Stop work · fire danger very high
Harvest site B · everyone in the zone
- Harvester operator, east edge Acknowledged 10:42
- Forwarder operator, east edge Acknowledged 10:42
- Harvester operator, south edge Acknowledged 10:44
- Forwarder operator, north slope Not seen · calling 10:46
3 of 4 have acknowledged. The fourth is being called.
Where there is already a requirement
In Portugal it is law. In Sweden it is the industry's own guideline.
Norway has guidelines. Other countries have gone further.
- Portugal
On days a municipality is rated very high or maximum, chainsaws, brush cutters with metal blades and other equipment that throws sparks may not be used in rural areas. Agricultural and forestry machines may run from sunset to 11:00. Felling and extraction outside that window need a permit from the municipal civil protection authority, applied for per site with coordinates and dates. The rating is set per municipality, every day.
- Source
Decreto-Lei 82/2021, article 69, as amended by Decreto-Lei 49/2022 and 56/2023.
- Sweden
Joint industry guidelines since 2017, drawn up by the forestry sector with the Swedish Forest Agency and MSB. Fire risk is assessed per site and kept current during the work. At a daily FWI of 4 or higher the contractor must call a consultation with the client, and it is documented. Every site directive carries an alarm coordinate.
- Source
Riskhantering avseende brand vid skogsarbete, branschgemensamma riktlinjer, 3rd edition, revised July 2024. Skogforsk.
Sweden already has a digital consultation per site, from SMHI. Contractor and client sign it, it is archived, and both get an SMS when the risk at the site changes. What we have not found in Portugal or Sweden is the stop you send to every person on the site, each one's acknowledgement, and the record of who got it.
Where we are
The alerting runs today. The forestry part we build with you.
Varsko has built the alerting engine: the alarm, the person's position while it is active, acknowledgement, escalation to the next person when no one answers, and an event log that no one can edit afterwards. It runs today, with a first group testing it. The zone, the fire danger for it, the stop-work alert to everyone in it, check-in and man-down are not built yet.
It runs on the phones the crew already carry, over the mobile network. Where a site has no coverage, nothing comes back, and the record shows who has not acknowledged. How often that happens on your sites is something we want to measure with you.
The fire danger signal for the site is what we are developing now, with the people who will use it. The alert and the record work without it. We want to run the signal through one fire season alongside the forecast you use today, site by site, before we say what it is worth. That is the season we run with a handful of operations in 2027. How, below.
What we are asking
A handful of operations run fire season 2027 with us. One of them can be yours.
We need a handful of operations. The site signal has to be tested against the forecast you use today, site by site, through one season, before anyone can say what it is worth. We cannot do that from an office in Norway. We can do it on your sites, with you.
Start with the read of one site. If it tells you something, the next step is a site in the season: the stop-work alert and the record built with you before it starts, and the site signal read beside your forecast through it. The season is priced per site and agreed in writing before it starts.
In Portugal the stop is law, so what the season gives you there is the record: which site, which day, who was told, who acknowledged. If you use SMHI's digital consultation in Sweden, the signal runs beside it, not instead of it. Nordic sites are agreed by March 2027. Southern European sites by May.
- You bring one site, one crew, and the person who decides when work stops.
- You keep the forecast and the routine you use today. Nothing changes in who decides.
- The season is priced per site, agreed before it starts. You can stop at any time.
- You get the alert, the acknowledgement, the call to whoever has not answered, and the record, on the phones your crew already carry. This runs today.
- The stop-work alert is not built yet. It is the first thing we build with the season’s operations, and you decide what it says and what the record must contain.
- You get the site signal read beside your forecast through the season, and the result at the end, site by site, whatever it says. And Morten on a short call every few weeks in season.
If this is already handled where you are, or the season is not for you, say so. A clear no is worth as much to us as a yes. Write it here, or to Morten: morten@varsko.no.
Write a site and you get the read. Morten answers himself within a few days. How we handle your email.
Thank you. Morten reads it himself and answers within a few days.
Who we are
Varsko AS
A Norwegian company. We build alerting and coordination technology for people who work alone or far from help. ForestSafe is that technology for forest operations, with the fire danger signal for the site that we are building now. Supported by Innovation Norway, the Norwegian government's innovation agency. About the company and the team.
The word
Varsko.
A Scandinavian word: to warn, to give notice of danger.
Norwegian
advare, gi beskjed om noe farlig, varselsrop
Danish
kortfattet og hurtigt melde om noget
Swedish
varna någon, underrätta eller meddela
Do you run forest operations in fire season?
Name one site. You get the read on it within a few days. If it tells you something, we talk about a site in the season. If someone else decides when work stops, send this to them.
Write a site and you get the read. Morten answers himself within a few days. We use your email and the site only to reply to you. How we handle your email.
Thank you. Morten reads it himself and answers within a few days.
Prefer to talk first? Book 30 minutes with Morten.
Morten Øverbye, CEO · morten@varsko.no
