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Bible Back Fire, August 2018 Custer

Out · last detection 29 Sept 2018, 09:16 UTC

The fire started on 18 August 2018 in Custer, United States, and satellites saw it burning for 43 days. United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC) mapped an official burnt perimeter of 1,406 hectares, spread across a single county.

It is the 178th largest in Idaho since 2016 (of 379 with a page). Number 261 in United States in 2018, of 511.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Ross Fork · 2022

Burnt area
1,406ha
official perimeter (MTBS / NIFC)
Duration
43days
18 Aug 2018 – 29 Sept 2018
Municipalities hit
1
counties
Started on
18 Aug
2018
Heat detections
238
in a single hotspot: 159 MW
Danger at start
14
Moderate · FWI index
Average daily power
148MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 18 Aug29 Sept
29 Sept 2018

How it evolved, day by day

18 Aug 2018 · 30 MW · 2 19 Aug 2018 · 33 MW · 2 20 Aug 2018 · 4 MW · 2 21 Aug 2018 · 170 MW · 7 22 Aug 2018 · 5 MW · 4 23 Aug 2018 · 60 MW · 7 24 Aug 2018 · 349 MW · 15 25 Aug 2018 · 751 MW · 36 26 Aug 2018 · 4 MW · 3 1 Sept 2018 · 12 MW · 1 2 Sept 2018 · 25 MW · 7 3 Sept 2018 · 169 MW · 19 4 Sept 2018 · 169 MW · 16 5 Sept 2018 · 648 MW · 38 6 Sept 2018 · 28 MW · 12 7 Sept 2018 · 161 MW · 11 8 Sept 2018 · 44 MW · 6 9 Sept 2018 · 266 MW · 8 11 Sept 2018 · 116 MW · 5 12 Sept 2018 · 3 MW · 2 17 Sept 2018 · 6 MW · 1 18 Sept 2018 · 5 MW · 1 19 Sept 2018 · 7 MW · 1 26 Sept 2018 · 705 MW · 8 27 Sept 2018 · 170 MW · 10 28 Sept 2018 · 51 MW · 9 29 Sept 2018 · 10 MW · 5
18 Aug 22 Aug 25 Aug 26 Aug 4 Sept 8 Sept 17 Sept 27 Sept

Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.

The weather it burned in

20°high
71km/h · peak gust
15%lowest humidity

It had gone 0 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 5.3 mm on 30 Sept.

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

How big is it?

10 km
It burned the equivalent of 0.9% of the area of London (14 km² against 1,583 km²).

London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).

This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.

What happened to each town

  1. Custer where it started
    1,396 ha reached on 18 Aug
    0.1 %

Burnt area inside each county, from crossing the official perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance is from the town centre to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.

The weather day by day

ECMWF ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, the standard reference for past weather, and the Canadian Fire Weather Index (the same system Copernicus uses), computed by WorldFires from that data. Days after the fire run until the first rain.

Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)

Day High Min. humidity Peak gust Rain Danger (FWI)
18 Aug 19.8 °C 21 % 42 km/h 0.4 mm Moderate 14
19 Aug 20.4 °C 24 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
20 Aug 14.0 °C 34 % 53 km/h 1.3 mm Low 11
21 Aug 15.3 °C 27 % 32 km/h 0.4 mm Moderate 15
22 Aug 14.0 °C 36 % 47 km/h 3.1 mm Very low 5
23 Aug 19.4 °C 20 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 13
24 Aug 16.6 °C 23 % 60 km/h 0.2 mm High 23
25 Aug 16.5 °C 22 % 59 km/h 0.1 mm High 26
26 Aug 12.5 °C 32 % 62 km/h 0.7 mm Moderate 20
27 Aug 6.8 °C 70 % 44 km/h 4.4 mm Very low 0
28 Aug 14.9 °C 25 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very low 4
29 Aug 17.8 °C 20 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 14
30 Aug 17.9 °C 23 % 57 km/h 0.3 mm High 22
31 Aug 15.0 °C 31 % 46 km/h 0.7 mm Moderate 16
1 Sept 17.5 °C 18 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
2 Sept 18.9 °C 16 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
3 Sept 19.1 °C 19 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
4 Sept 19.5 °C 19 % 41 km/h 0.1 mm High 27
5 Sept 20.1 °C 16 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
6 Sept 16.8 °C 20 % 37 km/h 1.6 mm Low 11
7 Sept 20.2 °C 21 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
8 Sept 18.1 °C 17 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
9 Sept 17.9 °C 16 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
10 Sept 17.0 °C 17 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
11 Sept 14.3 °C 21 % 64 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
12 Sept 10.0 °C 28 % 60 km/h 0.5 mm High 30
13 Sept 7.7 °C 36 % 52 km/h 1.9 mm Low 6
14 Sept 12.5 °C 23 % 60 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
15 Sept 11.5 °C 25 % 71 km/h 3.1 mm Very low 5
16 Sept 13.7 °C 16 % 60 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 14
17 Sept 15.5 °C 16 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 21
18 Sept 15.5 °C 15 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
19 Sept 12.1 °C 20 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
20 Sept 11.5 °C 20 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
21 Sept 15.5 °C 20 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
22 Sept 15.7 °C 16 % 58 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
23 Sept 7.1 °C 41 % 59 km/h 1.1 mm Low 10
24 Sept 8.2 °C 25 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 15
25 Sept 11.0 °C 20 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
26 Sept 14.3 °C 16 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
27 Sept 16.2 °C 25 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
28 Sept 15.8 °C 19 % 55 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
29 Sept 14.8 °C 19 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
30 Sept after 6.4 °C 43 % 56 km/h 5.3 mm Very low 1

Before and after, from space

Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.

Before · 11 Aug 2018
After · 6 Oct 2018

If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.

Detections table · 238Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
⬇ Download CSV Times in UTC. Each detection is a 375 m pixel: a large fire yields hundreds per pass.
Date and timeSatelliteFRP (MW)LatLon

Other fires nearby

All fires in United States ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Bible Back fire last?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 18 August 2018 to 29 September 2018 (43 days). The perimeter dates it from 18 August 2018 to 18 August 2018.
How much area did it burn?
The official perimeter published by United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC) is 1,406 hectares (14.1 km²). Other tallies, such as daily incident reports, may give slightly different figures.
Which counties burned?
The fire only entered Custer (1,396 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 20.4 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 71 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 33, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the official burnt perimeter of United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC, public domain), NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of United States. It is not an official report.

Where to verify it

A satellite detection is not an official report. Final figures and the fire’s status are published by each country’s emergency service.

Emergency number: 911

Satellite cross-check

Does something look wrong on this page?

This page is built from satellite data and official records, and it sometimes gets things wrong: the wrong dates, the wrong town, two fires merged into one, or something that was not a wildfire at all. If you know this fire first-hand (you live nearby, saw it, fought it or reported on it), tell us what really happened and we will check it.

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We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy. This is not an emergency service: if there is a fire now, call 911.

How we know this
  • Perimeter: MTBS (US Geological Survey and US Forest Service), official.
  • Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 18 August 2018 to 18 August 2018. 238 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
  • We have not matched this page with any official record.
  • Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.

How we build fire pages: methodology ›

Where this data comes from

The perimeter is official and in the public domain. For past years it comes from MTBS (Monitoring Trends in Burn Severity), run by the U.S. Geological Survey and the USDA Forest Service, which map it on Landsat and Sentinel-2 imagery. For the current and last year it comes from WFIGS at the National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC): incident perimeters mapped by fire crews, aircraft and imagery. Heat detections come from the VIIRS sensors aboard Suomi-NPP and NOAA-20, distributed by NASA FIRMS at 375 m resolution. County boundaries come from geoBoundaries ADM2 (Public Domain). The area per county is computed by WorldFires by crossing the perimeter with those boundaries, so it may differ slightly from official figures.