RAPID: Bridging the Data Gap: Capturing Ephemeral Data to Enhance Wildfire Resilience and Recovery after the 2025 Devastating Los Angeles Fires

The objective of this Grants for Rapid Response Research (RAPID) project is to support the collection of ephemeral data on wildfire impacts, community mitigation efforts, and recovery processes after Los Angeles Fires. Without timely data collection, valuable insights into recovery efforts, resource availability, and resilience-building are lost. Wildfires are increasing in frequency and severity, yet there are critical gaps in documenting how communities prepare for, experience, and recover from these disasters.

The project systematically gathers and preserves this data, making it publicly available for researchers, policymakers, and disaster recovery professionals. By improving access to essential information, it informs communities on rebuilding activities and policymakers on risk reduction strategies.

This project collects essential data to advance understanding of how human and community-level factors shape wildfire risk, impacts, and recovery. It addresses critical gaps in post-disaster data, which are rarely collected systematically yet are vital for improving disaster recovery modeling and strengthening long-term community resilience. Through official documents, interviews with key stakeholders, and focus groups with community-based organizations, the project focuses on three key areas: (1) the transition from emergency response to recovery governance, (2) the structure and effectiveness of evolving recovery frameworks, and (3) the policies, obstacles, and support systems influencing recovery, including the changing role of philanthropic and nonprofit organizations.

By capturing multiple snapshots of the recovery process over a year, it gains unique insights that inform broader disaster risk modeling, resilience planning, and policy development. The data is publicly shared through the NHERI DesignSafe Data Depot, ensuring accessibility for researchers, policymakers, and practitioners working to enhance wildfire resilience nationwide.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.