Identifying Blunt Force Traumatic Injury on Thermally Altered Remains: A Pilot Study Using Sus scrofa

In forensic scenarios involving homicide, human remains are often exposed to fire as a means of disposal and/or obscuring identity. Burning human remains can result in the concealment of traumatic injury, the creation of artifacts resembling injury, or the destruction of preexisting trauma. Since fire exposure can greatly influence trauma preservation, methods to differentiate trauma signatures from burning artifacts are necessary to conduct forensic analyses. Specifically, in the field of forensic anthropology, criteria to distinguish trauma from fire signatures on bone is inconsistent and sparse. This study aims to supplement current forensic anthropological literature by identifying criteria found to be the most diagnostic of fire damage or blunt force trauma. Using the skulls of 11 adult pigs (Sus scrofa), blunt force trauma was manually produced using a crowbar and flat-faced hammer. Three specimens received no impacts and were utilized as controls. All skulls were relocated to an outdoor, open-air fire where they were burned until a calcined state was achieved across all samples. Results from this experiment found that blunt force trauma signatures remained after burning and were identifiable in all samples where reassociation of fragments was possible. This study concludes that distinct patterns attributed to thermal fractures and blunt force fractures are identifiable, allowing for diagnostic criteria to be narrowed down for future analyses.

Structural and functional analysis of reconnaissance and fire system and decomposition of its functions and subsystems

It is established that the role of reconnaissance and fire systems in the implementation of enemy fire damage in military conflicts occurring at the beginning of the XXI century. Increased to 75%. However, it was found that the effectiveness of these systems depends on the quality of their equipment. The main factors that are often not taken into account in the acquisition are the possibility, interoperability, stability of each element, the impact of elements on the stability of each other and the functioning of the RVS as a whole. The analysis of recent research and publications has shown that as of today, the approaches to determining the composition of reconnaissance fire systems taking into account these factors are not justified. Given the above, it was decided to conduct a structural and functional analysis of the reconnaissance fire system and the decomposition of its functions and subsystems. To this end, based on the method of cluster analysis, an algorithm for combining a set of tasks performed by reconnaissance and fire systems into groups has been developed and substantiated. The method of expert evaluation was used to obtain substantiated data on the implementation of such a merger. According to the proposed algorithm, the main tasks were first identified, which involve reconnaissance and fire systems. Subsequently, an expert group was formed and the coefficient of relative competence of each member of the expert group was determined. The experts were then asked to combine the identified tasks according to their characteristics into an arbitrary number of groups. After processing the opinions of experts, 10 characteristic groups were identified. Finally, the experts were asked to combine the obtained groups in such a way that each association consisted of similar objects and the objects of different associations differed significantly. The results of the work revealed the functional interconnectedness of the tasks, processes and subsystems of the reconnaissance and fire system. It is also established that a typical reconnaissance fire system will consist of three subsystems (control, reconnaissance and fire influence), which perform specific functions for each of them.

Characteristics of Spatiotemporal Changes in the Occurrence of Forest Fires

The purpose of this study is to understand the characteristics of the spatial distribution of forest fire occurrences with the local indicators of temporal burstiness in Korea. Forest fire damage data were produced in the form of areas by combining the forest fire damage ledger information with VIIRS-based forest fire occurrence data. Then, detrended fluctuation analysis and the local indicator of temporal burstiness were applied. In the results, the forest fire occurrence follows a self-organized criticality mechanism, and the temporal irregularities of fire occurrences exist. When the forest fire occurrence time series in Gyeonggi-do Province, which had the highest value of the local indicator of temporal burstiness, was checked, it was found that the frequency of forest fires was increasing at intervals of about 10 years. In addition, when the frequencies of forest fires and the spatial distribution of the local indicators of forest fire occurrences were compared, it was found that there were spatial differences in the occurrence of forest fires. This study is meaningful in that it analyzed the time series characteristics of the distribution of forest fires in Korea to understand that forest fire occurrences have long-term temporal correlations and identified areas where the temporal irregularities of forest fire occurrences are remarkable with the local indicators of temporal burstiness.

Devising a procedure for justifying the need for samples of weapons and weapon target assignment when using a reconnaissance firing system

This paper proposes an algorithm to substantiate the need for weapons samples, as well as targeting when using a reconnaissance firing system taking into consideration the peculiarities of functioning of such systems. The algorithm essentially implies streamlining the stages in determining the magnitude of the reduction of the enemy's combat potential and, on its basis, the formation of the need for the number of weapons by type. The algorithm makes it possible to take into consideration the nonlinearity of functions that describe both different types of weapons and targets. In addition, this algorithm is based on a modified method of nonlinear programming (two functions). The modification involves the use of a normalized share of the weight of each target as weight coefficients. This allows for targeting while taking into consideration the established level of the combat potential of an enemy. A procedure for determining the need for samples of weapons and targeting in the use of reconnaissance firing systems has been devised. It was determined that in order to achieve the goal of enemy fire damage, it is not typically necessary to use all weapons samples. In general, the procedure makes it possible to take into consideration the peculiarities of the samples of weapons and their suitability to hit a certain target. That could prevent problems with overspending of resources, failures in the detection-defeat cycle, non-fulfillment (not fully performing) tasks during enemy fire damage. In general, the algorithm and procedure for determining the need for the samples of weapons and targeting when using a reconnaissance firing system testify to devising a methodology for justifying the need for weapons samples and targeting. The performance and adequacy of this procedure have been tested by considering an example of determining the need for weapons samples and targeting and obtaining the result confirmed by the experience in the use of reconnaissance firing systems

Housing arrangement and vegetation factors associated with single-family home survival in the 2018 Camp Fire, California

Background The 2018 Camp Fire, which destroyed 18,804 structures in northern California, including most of the town of Paradise, provided an opportunity to investigate housing arrangement and vegetation-related factors associated with home loss and determine whether California’s 2008 adoption of exterior building codes for homes located in the wildland-urban-interface (WUI) improved survival. We randomly sampled single-family homes constructed: before 1997, 1997 to 2007, and 2008 to 2018, the latter two time periods being before and after changes to the building code. We then quantified the nearby pre-fire overstory canopy cover and the distance to the nearest destroyed home and structure from aerial imagery. Using post-fire photographs, we also assessed fire damage and assigned a cause for damaged but not destroyed homes. Results Homes built prior to 1997 fared poorly, with only 11.5% surviving, compared with 38.5% survival for homes built in 1997 and after. The difference in survival percentage for homes built immediately before and after the adoption of Chapter 7A in the California Building Code (37% and 44%, respectively) was not statistically significant. Distance to nearest destroyed structure, number of structures destroyed within 100 m, and pre-fire overstory canopy cover within 100 m of the home were the strongest predictors of survival, but significant interactions with the construction time period suggested that factors contributing to survival differed for homes of different ages. Homes >18 m from a destroyed structure and in areas with pre-fire overstory canopy cover within 30–100 m of the home of <53% survived at a substantially higher rate than homes in closer proximity to a destroyed structure or in areas with higher pre-fire overstory canopy cover. Most fire damage to surviving homes appeared to result from radiant heat from nearby burning structures or flame impingement from the ignition of near-home combustible materials. Conclusions Strong associations between both distance to nearest destroyed structure and vegetation within 100 m and home survival in the Camp Fire indicate building and vegetation modifications are possible that would substantially improve outcomes. Among those include improvements to windows and siding in closest proximity to neighboring structures, treatment of wildland fuels, and eliminating near-home combustibles, especially in areas closest to the home (0–1.5 m).