Natural disastrous events are part and parcel of our times and do occur when we least expect it to strike us. Disasters which take place in the vicinity of human livelihood due to natural causes, such as forest fires, tsunami, earthquakes, floods, storms etc., the consequence or toll on lives and structures is colossal. Such mishaps emphasize and prove the fact that nature is the true master and has gone beyond human resistivity or control mechanisms by miles. Each of such mishaps provide crucial lessons or experiences to learn from. Fortunately, several disaster management approaches and technology advancements help with definitive affirmative knowledge and analysis, mitigating impacts to human lives and structures.

This paper survey's existing approaches in managing forest fires. We focus on specific aspects with forest fire disaster, such as: fire localization, fire propagation modeling, victim localization, victim health evaluation, and logistics involved with securing victims to safety. A comprehensive discussion on the state-of-the-art works in managing forest fires is presented. Finally, this survey highlights open challenges and research trends in handling forest fire disaster management systems.