What is the price of catastrophic wildfire?

We modeled and analyzed the economic impacts of the six weeks of large, cat astrophic wildfires in northeastern Florida in June and July 1998, among Fl orida's most devastating in recent history. The result of the unusually str ong El Nino-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) in 1998, the Florida wildfires prod uced economic impacts of at least $600 million, similar in scale to recent category-2 hurricanes. Improved understanding of the interactions between m anagement, wildfire, and its costs may yield large payoffs to society by id entifying optimal intervention activities.