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Electra Complex, December 2021 Wichita, Wilbarger

Out · last detection 10 Dec 2021, 18:58 UTC

The fire started on 10 December 2021 in Wichita, United States, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC) mapped an official burnt perimeter of 588 hectares, spread across 2 counties.

It is the 255th largest in Texas since 2016 (of 327 with a page). Number 320 in United States in 2021, of 385.

Burnt area
588ha
official perimeter (MTBS / NIFC)
Duration
1day
10 Dec 2021 – 10 Dec 2021
Municipalities hit
2
counties
Started on
10 Dec
2021
Heat detections
13
in a single hotspot: 80 MW
Danger at start
57
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
800MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 10 Dec10 Dec

How it evolved, day by day

10

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

The weather it burned in

27°high
78km/h · peak gust
19%lowest humidity

It had gone 12 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 2.7 mm on 17 Dec.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Wichita where it started
    380 ha reached on 10 Dec
    0.2 %
  2. Wilbarger
    204 ha reached on 10 Dec
    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)
10 Dec 27.3 °C 19 % 78 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
11 Dec after 15.7 °C 16 % 70 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
12 Dec after 19.1 °C 12 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
13 Dec after 22.4 °C 14 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
14 Dec after 25.3 °C 33 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
15 Dec after 27.7 °C 41 % 75 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
16 Dec after 20.8 °C 13 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
17 Dec after 20.7 °C 31 % 32 km/h 2.7 mm Low 8

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 3 Dec 2021
After · 17 Dec 2021

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 · 13Every 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 Electra Complex fire last?
It burned between 10 December 2021 and 10 December 2021: 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 588 hectares (5.9 km²). Other tallies, such as daily incident reports, may give slightly different figures.
Which counties burned?
The fire entered 2 counties: Wichita (380 ha, 0.2 %); Wilbarger (204 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 27.3 °C, humidity dropped to 19 % and gusts hit 78 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 57, class Extreme.
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.

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.