Burned area Ofunato City. Credit: Tohoku University Wildfires battered Iwate Prefecture in northeastern Japan for 11 days, starting on April 22. The fires burned about 1,600 hectares and forced 3,200 residents to evacuate. With warmer climates, continued expansion of urban areas into forested regions, and the increasing frequency of extreme weather events, disasters like these are becoming more common around the world, underscoring the urgent need for advances in fire safety science and predictive modeling. To address this growing global challenge, a new international effort to establish standardized approaches for modeling large outdoor fires is now underway under the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). The project, ISO/AWI TS 26520—Modeling Approaches for Large Outdoor Fires, has officially been added to the work program of ISO Technical Committee 92 (Fire Safety), following the successful approval of a global ballot in March 2026.…