GCP – How WindTL is transforming wildfire management with Google Cloud

Imagine a world where we could outsmart wildfires, predict their chaotic spread, and shield communities from their devastating reach. That’s the vision Rocio Frej Vitalle and the Improving Aviation team had when they created WindTL, a tool driven by the raw power of AI and data. 

Turning this vision into a practical reality meant building a service-model tool that could handle massive data streams and complex AI models in order to deliver real-time wildfire predictions to first responders. Google Cloud provided the essential foundation for the Improving Aviation team to build the SkyTL core architecture to WindTL’s platform, leveraging Google Cloud’s scalable infrastructure for data processing and model deployment.

Scaling the new tool demanded both technical expertise and a strong strategic partnership. Google Cloud engineers consulted on AI, streaming data, and runtime architectures, while experts from Google for Startups provided leadership guidance. This support enabled Improving Aviation to rapidly enhance WindTL’s capabilities and significantly amplify their impact to the fire and rescue industry.

With Improving Aviation’s wildfire software, WindTL, end users now have science-based AI-decision making powers, obtaining a much more accurate understanding of the probability and severity of wildfire ignition risks before and during a disaster. WindTL isn’t just another fire model; it’s a lifeline, designed to combat the silent killer of wildfire destruction: ember spread, responsible for a staggering 90% of structural losses [1] built with Google Cloud technology. 

*WindTL, developed by Improving Aviation, is a decision support tool designed for real-time situational awareness, pre-fire risk assessment, and predictive wildfire modeling. WindTL leverages AI-powered models to deliver accurate wildfire spread, ember behavior, and ignition risk predictions, equipping field personnel with the intelligence needed to make proactive, data-driven decisions.

Scalable wildfire response: WindTL’s Google Cloud architecture & framework explained

WindTL operates as a fully integrated product within SkyTL, leveraging a modular, cloud-based architecture that ensures real-time situational awareness and predictive analytics. At its core, WindTL’s architecture consists of these components:

• Data ingestion pipeline: Collecting data from satellites, drones, IoT sensors, and weather stations enabling real-time wildfire condition analysis.

• Collection of historical data (Gemini): Engineered a comprehensive historical wildfire dataset by extracting and structuring disparate publicly available online data sources which directly fueled the machine learning model’s predictive behavior.

• AI-driven modeling (Vertex AI): Utilizing physics-informed neural networks (PINNs) and custom machine learning models deployed on Google Cloud’s Vertex AI for ember risk and fire behavior prediction.

• BigQuery data analytics: Leveraging BigQuery for scalable storage and real-time analysis of massive datasets, providing actionable insights for decision-makers.

• Interactive web UI (SkyTL integration): A user-friendly, web-based interface, integrated with Improving Aviation’s SkyTL backend, for visualizing fire spread models, high-risk zones, and supporting informed suppression strategy development.

• Cloud-native scalability (GKE): Employing Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE) for rapid scaling and low-latency responses, ensuring concurrent access for thousands of users and adaptability to large-scale wildfire events.

The following architectural diagram illustrates WindTL’s seamless integration into emergency response workflows, providing firefighters, emergency responders and insurance providers with reliable, real-time intelligence for critical decision-making.

Google Cloud helped WindTL revolutionize wildfire prediction

Since 2024, the Improving Aviation team has partnered closely with Google Cloud engineers to scale and enhance the WindTL tool. Leveraging Google’s AI and cloud technologies, Improving Aviation has achieved the following:

• Accelerated model execution: Utilizing Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE) and optimized cloud computing, Improving Aviation reduced AI model run times over local execution for wildfire simulations.

• Scalable data processing: By implementing Google Cloud’s BigQuery and Vertex AI, Improving Aviation enabled the ingestion and analysis of massive, real-time wildfire datasets, providing critical up-to-the-minute intelligence.

• Improved prediction accuracy: Integration of Google’s physics-informed neural networks (PINNs) significantly enhanced ember spread prediction accuracy, leading to more precise risk assessments and resource allocation.

WindTL spotlight: driving innovation featured in Google Cloud video

Improving Aviation’s revolutionary AI is showcased in the short video Predicting wildfire behavior with WindTL & Google AI. Released on Google Cloud Tech’s YouTube channel, the video dives deep into how WindTL leverages Google AI to predict wildfire behavior, breaking down the science of ember spread and demonstrating how real-time decision support is saving lives and catastrophic property losses. 

Improving Aviation’s Tampa headquarters was the site of a Google Cloud team onsite visit, where they documented WindTL’s core engineering processes and captured the behind-the-scenes magic that powers WindTL. You can read more about Improving Aviation’s experience in Transforming Wildfire Management: Google Cloud Highlights WindTL’s Innovation.

Lessons learned: accelerating AI development with Google Cloud partnership

The partnership between Improving Aviation and Google Cloud yielded more than just technical enhancements—it provided critical insights applicable to developers building AI-powered systems:

• Scalability as a core requirement: Designing for real-time applications, particularly in critical domains like wildfire management, demands inherently scalable architectures. This necessitates leveraging cloud-native services for dynamic resource allocation and efficient data processing.

• Collaborative model: Direct collaboration with Google’s AI and Outbound Strategy & Enable Cloud engineering teams enabled Improving Aviation engineers to implement iterative model optimization, resulting in significantly improved predictive accuracy. Shared knowledge, sprints, and access to specialized tooling accelerated our development cycles.

Build AI-powered solutions with Google Cloud

Traditional wildfire response methods are proving insufficient against escalating wildfire severity. With WindTL and Vertex AI, Improving Aviation is innovating in disaster management through advanced AI applications. Supported by Google Cloud’s infrastructure and AI tools, Improving Aviation is building WindTL to be a scalable and resilient system to address the complex data processing and prediction challenges associated with extreme wildfires. 

To get started, learn more about Vertex AI. To learn more about WindTL, watch How WindTL Predicted the Palisades Fire: A Breakthrough in Wildfire Management.

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