How long did the Flat Top fire last?

It burned between 7 September 2024 and 7 September 2024: 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 14,793 hectares (147.9 km²). Other tallies, such as daily incident reports, may give slightly different figures.

Which counties burned?

The fire entered 2 counties: Lake (14,764 ha, 0.7 %); Deschutes (294 ha, 0.0 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 31.2 °C, humidity dropped to 11 % and gusts hit 56 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 52, 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.

US · United States · 2024-09-07 → 2024-09-07

Flat Top Fire, September 2024 Lake, Deschutes

Out · last detection 8 Sept 2024, 20:35 UTC

The fire started on 7 September 2024 in Lake, United States, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC) mapped an official burnt perimeter of 14,793 hectares, spread across 2 counties.

It is the 51th largest in Oregon since 2016 (of 327 with a page). Number 32 in United States in 2024, of 371.

Burnt area: 14,793ha; official perimeter (MTBS / NIFC)
Duration: 1day; 7 Sept 2024 – 7 Sept 2024
Municipalities hit: 2; counties
Started on: 7 Sept; 2024
Heat detections: 2,134; in a single hotspot: 592 MW
Danger at start: 52; Extreme · FWI index
Energy released: 4.2GW; sum of detected power

Play back 8 Sept 2024

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 7 Sept7 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

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

The weather it burned in

31°high

56km/h · peak gust

11%lowest humidity

It had gone 13 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.4 mm on 17 Sept.

This area had burned before

0% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 11 ha in 2019.

What happened to each town

Lake where it started

14,764 ha reached on 7 Sept

0.7 %
Deschutes

294 ha reached on 7 Sept

0.0 %

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)
7 Sept	31.2 °C	11 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 52
8 Sept after	29.9 °C	18 %	35 km/h	0.1 mm	Very high 47
9 Sept after	30.4 °C	14 %	33 km/h	0.1 mm	Very high 50
10 Sept after	26.3 °C	23 %	42 km/h	0.4 mm	Very high 46
11 Sept after	14.3 °C	53 %	56 km/h	1.4 mm	Moderate 15
12 Sept after	18.9 °C	29 %	30 km/h	0.1 mm	High 21
13 Sept after	24.2 °C	14 %	20 km/h	0.0 mm	High 29
14 Sept after	25.3 °C	19 %	45 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
15 Sept after	15.8 °C	39 %	36 km/h	0.6 mm	High 30
16 Sept after	15.9 °C	46 %	45 km/h	0.8 mm	Moderate 20
17 Sept after	18.3 °C	30 %	47 km/h	1.4 mm	Moderate 18

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 31 Aug 2024

After · 14 Sept 2024

Before After

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

The smoke

CAMS · Copernicus

On 8 September 2024 the air beside the fire reached 171 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 93: 6.2 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak171 µg/m³

Days over the guideline6 days

PM10246 µg/m³

Optical depth2.18

WHO 15

567891011121314151617

Good Fair Moderate Poor Very poor Extremely poor

Particles from the Copernicus CAMS model at the centre of the perimeter; these are not measurements in each town. The pale bar is the worst hour, the solid one the daily average.

Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS)

Detections table · 2,134Every 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 time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

All fires in United States ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Flat Top fire last?: It burned between 7 September 2024 and 7 September 2024: 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 14,793 hectares (147.9 km²). Other tallies, such as daily incident reports, may give slightly different figures.
Which counties burned?: The fire entered 2 counties: Lake (14,764 ha, 0.7 %); Deschutes (294 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 31.2 °C, humidity dropped to 11 % and gusts hit 56 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 52, 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

NASA FIRMS ↗
NIFC · Fire maps ↗

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.

Report an error

What do you think is wrong?

Dates or duration Place or towns Burned area Name It was not a wildfire Same fire as another page Something else

What really happened?

Your connection to the fire (optional) Email (optional)

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.

Where it burned