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Brownstone Fire, August 2018 Powell

Out · last detection 3 Aug 2018, 20:10 UTC

The fire started on 2 August 2018 in Powell, United States, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC) mapped an official burnt perimeter of 1,681 hectares, spread across a single county.

It is the 125th largest in Montana since 2016 (of 302 with a page). Number 226 in United States in 2018, of 511.

Burnt area
1,681ha
official perimeter (MTBS / NIFC)
Duration
1day
2 Aug 2018 – 2 Aug 2018
Municipalities hit
1
counties
Started on
2 Aug
2018
Heat detections
309
in a single hotspot: 264 MW
Danger at start
29
High · FWI index
Energy released
93MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

3 Aug 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 2 Aug2 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

23

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

The weather it burned in

32°high
72km/h · peak gust
7%lowest humidity

It had gone 4 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 4.4 mm on 20 Sept.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Powell where it started
    1,696 ha reached on 2 Aug
    0.3 %

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)
2 Aug 24.6 °C 17 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
3 Aug after 19.9 °C 23 % 66 km/h 0.4 mm High 28
4 Aug after 17.1 °C 35 % 34 km/h 1.1 mm Low 10
5 Aug after 17.6 °C 43 % 27 km/h 0.7 mm Low 8
6 Aug after 22.1 °C 22 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19
7 Aug after 23.0 °C 20 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
8 Aug after 26.1 °C 19 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
9 Aug after 29.5 °C 14 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
10 Aug after 32.0 °C 7 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
11 Aug after 27.3 °C 15 % 50 km/h 1.1 mm High 27
12 Aug after 19.6 °C 27 % 55 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
13 Aug after 21.5 °C 20 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
14 Aug after 22.2 °C 17 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
15 Aug after 24.2 °C 15 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
16 Aug after 24.9 °C 14 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
17 Aug after 23.5 °C 21 % 33 km/h 0.6 mm High 27
18 Aug after 19.7 °C 17 % 37 km/h 0.2 mm High 28
19 Aug after 19.6 °C 29 % 30 km/h 0.7 mm Moderate 21
20 Aug after 9.7 °C 75 % 55 km/h 6.3 mm Very low 0
21 Aug after 16.9 °C 38 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very low 4
22 Aug after 19.9 °C 23 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 12
23 Aug after 20.2 °C 25 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 21
24 Aug after 15.4 °C 32 % 64 km/h 0.4 mm High 23
25 Aug after 15.7 °C 25 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 21
26 Aug after 9.4 °C 51 % 47 km/h 1.4 mm Low 7
27 Aug after 6.9 °C 61 % 41 km/h 5.4 mm Very low 0
28 Aug after 12.5 °C 40 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Very low 4
29 Aug after 18.7 °C 27 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Low 11
30 Aug after 16.5 °C 30 % 68 km/h 0.6 mm Moderate 17
31 Aug after 14.8 °C 34 % 56 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
1 Sept after 14.3 °C 29 % 60 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
2 Sept after 15.9 °C 28 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
3 Sept after 15.8 °C 32 % 72 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
4 Sept after 15.3 °C 29 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
5 Sept after 21.1 °C 18 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
6 Sept after 24.0 °C 15 % 39 km/h 0.2 mm High 29
7 Sept after 22.1 °C 22 % 42 km/h 0.3 mm High 30
8 Sept after 16.9 °C 34 % 62 km/h 0.5 mm High 28
9 Sept after 16.6 °C 24 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
10 Sept after 17.3 °C 27 % 70 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
11 Sept after 12.2 °C 32 % 43 km/h 0.2 mm High 22
12 Sept after 9.9 °C 30 % 41 km/h 0.7 mm Moderate 16
13 Sept after 7.5 °C 49 % 43 km/h 0.8 mm Low 10
14 Sept after 11.3 °C 31 % 43 km/h 0.1 mm Moderate 16
15 Sept after 14.2 °C 31 % 46 km/h 4.4 mm Very low 3
16 Sept after 10.2 °C 55 % 55 km/h 4.6 mm Very low 0
17 Sept after 11.0 °C 39 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very low 3
18 Sept after 11.1 °C 35 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Low 6
19 Sept after 9.8 °C 50 % 29 km/h 1.9 mm Very low 2
20 Sept after 7.9 °C 55 % 49 km/h 4.4 mm Very low 0

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 26 Jul 2018
After · 9 Aug 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 · 309Every 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 Brownstone fire last?
It burned between 2 August 2018 and 2 August 2018: 1 day, according to the start date recorded by United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC) and the heat detections seen by satellite.
How much area did it burn?
The official perimeter published by United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC) is 1,681 hectares (16.8 km²). Other tallies, such as daily incident reports, may give slightly different figures.
Which counties burned?
The fire only entered Powell (1,696 ha, 0.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 32.0 °C, humidity dropped to 7 % and gusts hit 72 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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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.