Burned area
satellite only2,548ha
Perimeter published by MTBS (USGS/USFS).
- Source
- MTBS (USGS/USFS)
- Date
- 8 Aug 2017 – 17 Sept 2017
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page to compare it with.
US · United States · –
Gibralter Ridge Fire, August 2017 Lincoln
Out · last detection 17 Sept 2017, 20:11 UTC
The fire started on 8 August 2017 in Lincoln, United States, and satellites saw it burning for 41 days. United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC) mapped an official burnt perimeter of 2,548 hectares, spread across a single county.
It is the 91th largest in Montana since 2016 (of 302 with a page). Number 229 in United States in 2017, of 619.
Use this data
Compare with…
Use this data
Fire page data · version 2026-10-24matches the official recordwith caveatssatellite onlymodel
When copying, the sentence is
Tick the figures you want: they make up the lede and the CSV.
Duration by satellite
satellite only41days
8 Aug 2017 to 17 Sept 2017: first and last day with fire on the page.
- Source
- MTBS (USGS/USFS) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- last detection: 17 Sept 2017, 20:11 UTC
+− cross-check
Satellites pass a few times a day and cloud or smoke can hide the fire: a lack of detections is not an official extinction. Each country’s emergency service declares a fire contained or out.
Start
satellite only8 Aug 2017
First day with fire seen by the satellites or the perimeter.
- Source
- MTBS (USGS/USFS) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- 8 Aug 2017
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page, so the alert time and the cause are not known here.
Hotspots
satellite only559
VIIRS detections at 375 m. Most intense hotspot: 261 MW.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (Suomi NPP)
- Date
- 8 Aug 2017 – 17 Sept 2017
+− cross-check
There is no official record to compare with. Each hotspot is a pixel detected in one satellite pass, not a separate fire.
The worst day
satellite only2,490MW
Total radiative power on 23 August 2017; hotspots that day: 42.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (FRP)
- Date
- 23 Aug 2017
+− cross-check
Fire radiative power (FRP) measures the energy the fire gives off when the satellite passes. Added up by day, it compares intensity, not area.
Danger at the start
model21.6FWI · high
Fire Weather Index (Canadian system) computed by WorldFires for the day the fire started. Consecutive days without rain before: 3.
- Source
- WorldFires calculation (Canadian FWI system)
- Date
- 8 Aug 2017, local noon
- Model
- ERA5 0,25° (ECMWF · Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com
+− cross-check
This is an index computed from weather model data, not a measurement of the fire nor an official warning. Danger warnings are issued by each country’s authority. Emergency number and official warnings
Weather during the fire
model27.7°C · 13% RH
High of 27.7 °C and minimum humidity of 13% on 29 August 2017; gusts of 68 km/h on 9 September 2017.
- Source
- weather model at the fire’s grid cell
- Date
- 8 Aug 2017 – 17 Sept 2017
- Model
- ERA5 0,25° (ECMWF · Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com
+− cross-check
These are model values for a cell of about 25 km, not from a weather station: they may differ from what was measured on the ground.
This page’s change log has been kept since 24 October 2026: every night what it publishes is compared and the difference is logged. Anything earlier is reconstructed from each source’s date and marked as reconstructed.
Show
-
· reconstructed weatherWeather and FWI computed from the ERA5 reanalysis
-
· reconstructed GHSLPopulation and built-up area computed
What was saved on 24 October 2026
Every night a snapshot of what the page shows is saved. If anything changes, it appears in the list as a log entry.
- Area
- 2,548 ha
- Dates
- 8 Aug 2017 – 17 Sept 2017
- Name
- Gibralter Ridge
- Official record
- —
Versioned permanent link
https://worldfires.org/en/fire/gibralter-ridge-fire-2017-08?v=2026-10-24A version keeps the area, dates, name and official record; the area as it was logged (changes under 2% are not logged). The map, hotspots and weather always show today’s data.
Citation
A lede of about 60 words figures only, no adjectives
CSV for this fire gibralter-ridge-fire-2017-08.csv · daily, no individual hotspots
| fecha | focos_viirs | frp_mw | tmax_c | tmin_c | hr_min_pct | viento_max_kmh | racha_max_kmh | precip_mm | fwi | clase_fwi | dentro_del_incendio |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2017-08-08 | 73 | 1,033 | 23.6 | 7.9 | 26 | 9.4 | 34.2 | 0.9 | 21.6 | alto | 1 |
| 2017-08-09 | 38 | 211 | 24.7 | 5.5 | 23 | 6.6 | 21.6 | 1.3 | 18.2 | moderado | 1 |
| 2017-08-10 | 46 | 178 | 24.9 | 7.1 | 21 | 7.1 | 25.6 | 0.7 | 17.7 | moderado | 1 |
| 2017-08-11 | 16 | 38 | 25.8 | 5.8 | 17 | 11.1 | 29.2 | 0 | 19.6 | moderado | 1 |
| 2017-08-12 | 29 | 107 | 26.2 | 6.3 | 15 | 8.7 | 31.7 | 0 | 29.2 | alto | 1 |
| 2017-08-13 | 5 | 20 | 15.7 | 8.9 | 47 | 16.3 | 52.6 | 1.9 | 13 | moderado | 1 |
| 2017-08-14 | 0 | 0 | 15.3 | 4.4 | 37 | 13.4 | 47.2 | 0.7 | 9.8 | bajo | 1 |
| 2017-08-15 | 1 | 3 | 19.8 | 0.8 | 21 | 11.3 | 40 | 0 | 22.4 | alto | 1 |
| 2017-08-16 | 1 | 1 | 21.6 | 6.7 | 22 | 14.2 | 47.5 | 0 | 32.3 | alto | 1 |
| 2017-08-17 | 27 | 281 | 22.8 | 7.8 | 19 | 13.8 | 46.4 | 0 | 35.5 | alto | 1 |
| 2017-08-18 | 32 | 185 | 23.1 | 7.3 | 18 | 17.7 | 55.4 | 0 | 42.5 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2017-08-19 | 18 | 23 | 18.8 | 5.8 | 19 | 14.8 | 50.4 | 0 | 41.5 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2017-08-20 | 13 | 97 | 18.5 | 6.7 | 21 | 14.4 | 43.6 | 0 | 38.8 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2017-08-21 | 7 | 8 | 20.7 | 3.2 | 20 | 8.3 | 27.4 | 0 | 29.3 | alto | 1 |
| 2017-08-22 | 5 | 47 | 25.4 | 6.1 | 17 | 7.9 | 25.9 | 0 | 31.5 | alto | 1 |
| 2017-08-23 | 42 | 2,490 | 25.5 | 8 | 16 | 13.6 | 43.2 | 0 | 40.7 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2017-08-24 | 0 | 0 | 19.3 | 10 | 27 | 16.4 | 59.8 | 1.3 | 18.3 | moderado | 1 |
| 2017-08-25 | 11 | 28 | 19.6 | 2.4 | 11 | 12.7 | 40.3 | 0 | 33.9 | alto | 1 |
| 2017-08-26 | 23 | 124 | 22.3 | 4.4 | 15 | 10 | 33.8 | 0 | 36.3 | alto | 1 |
| 2017-08-27 | 18 | 37 | 26.2 | 6.7 | 11 | 9.2 | 29.9 | 0 | 39 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2017-08-28 | 35 | 393 | 26.9 | 8.7 | 11 | 7.9 | 28.4 | 0 | 37.7 | alto | 1 |
| 2017-08-29 | 33 | 89 | 27.7 | 9.5 | 13 | 9.5 | 36.4 | 0.2 | 44.2 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2017-08-30 | 24 | 248 | 26.2 | 10.2 | 16 | 14.7 | 43.9 | 0.2 | 39.5 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2017-08-31 | 4 | 4 | 21.8 | 9.9 | 19 | 16.9 | 55.1 | 0 | 54.4 | extremo | 1 |
| 2017-09-01 | 0 | 0 | 23 | 4.5 | 18 | 16.9 | 53.6 | 0 | 49.5 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2017-09-02 | 1 | 0 | 26.5 | 8.6 | 14 | 16.6 | 53.3 | 0 | 46.1 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2017-09-03 | 1 | 1 | 27 | 7 | 10 | 13.6 | 48.2 | 0 | 47.2 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2017-09-04 | 3 | 33 | 20.8 | 6.6 | 24 | 10.9 | 37.4 | 0 | 40.4 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2017-09-05 | 2 | 5 | 22.2 | 1.4 | 16 | 4.8 | 19.1 | 0 | 31.1 | alto | 1 |
| 2017-09-06 | 7 | 13 | 24.8 | 6.1 | 15 | 4.8 | 21.2 | 0 | 31.5 | alto | 1 |
| 2017-09-07 | 2 | 5 | 26.3 | 6.4 | 16 | 6.8 | 25.9 | 0 | 38.2 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2017-09-08 | 7 | 17 | 22.7 | 10.4 | 26 | 10.7 | 46.1 | 0 | 39.9 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2017-09-09 | 8 | 20 | 21.9 | 10.8 | 29 | 19.5 | 67.7 | 1.6 | 36.4 | alto | 1 |
| 2017-09-10 | 5 | 20 | 17.4 | 8.3 | 24 | 16.2 | 51.5 | 0 | 27.7 | alto | 1 |
| 2017-09-11 | 12 | 82 | 21.9 | 6.1 | 14 | 15 | 48.2 | 0 | 32 | alto | 1 |
| 2017-09-12 | 7 | 23 | 21.1 | 7.4 | 18 | 14.1 | 49.3 | 0 | 38.5 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2017-09-13 | 0 | 0 | 15.5 | 3.8 | 21 | 15 | 47.9 | 0 | 40.6 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2017-09-14 | 0 | 0 | 6.2 | 1.1 | 50 | 14.8 | 46.1 | 0 | 28.4 | alto | 1 |
| 2017-09-15 | 0 | 0 | 6.9 | -1.9 | 27 | 13.2 | 41 | 0.3 | 25.9 | alto | 1 |
| 2017-09-16 | 1 | 2 | 10.8 | -6.1 | 23 | 11 | 35.3 | 0 | 23.9 | alto | 1 |
| 2017-09-17 | 2 | 5 | 13.4 | -0.5 | 20 | 12.4 | 41.8 | 0 | 28.8 | alto | 1 |
| 2017-09-18 | 0 | 0 | 7.5 | 0.2 | 49 | 9.4 | 42.8 | 10.6 | 0 | muy_bajo | 0 |
It is generated in your browser from this page’s data: one file per fire, aggregated by day and without individual hotspots.
Live widget for your story
It updates itself while the fire is still active and links to this page. Free, with the attribution shown at the bottom.
Sources for this page: MTBS (USGS/USFS), NASA FIRMS (VIIRS), ERA5 (ECMWF/Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0), GHSL (JRC). Open-Meteo.com · How we build fire pages: methodology
- Burnt area
- 2,548ha
- official perimeter (MTBS / NIFC)
- Duration
- ≈ 41days
- 8 Aug 2017 – 17 Sept 2017
- Counties hit
- 1
- counties
- Started on
- 8 Aug
- 2017
- Heat detections
- 559
- in a single hotspot: 261 MW
- Danger at start
- 22
- High · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 168MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
HOTSPOTS BY DAY
8 Aug17 Sept
17 Sept 2017
How it evolved, day by day
8 Aug
16 Aug
23 Aug
31 Aug
8 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
28°high
68km/h · peak gust
10%lowest humidity
It had gone 3 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 10.6 mm on 18 Sept.
This area had burned before
No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
Berlin boundary: geoBoundaries · Federal Agency for Cartography and Geodesy (dl-de/by-2-0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each county
-
Lincoln where it started2,563 ha reached on 8 Aug0.3 %
Burnt area inside each county, from crossing the official perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.
People and buildings inside the perimeter
GHSL 2015Built-up area< 0.1 ha
Residents< 20
Inside the perimeter there was no noticeable built-up land and almost nobody lived there (GHSL 2015, satellite-based estimate).
This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned.
Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 8 Aug | 23.6 °C | 26 % | 34 km/h | 0.9 mm | High 22 |
| 9 Aug | 24.7 °C | 23 % | 22 km/h | 1.3 mm | Moderate 18 |
| 10 Aug | 24.9 °C | 21 % | 26 km/h | 0.7 mm | Moderate 18 |
| 11 Aug | 25.8 °C | 17 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 20 |
| 12 Aug | 26.2 °C | 15 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 13 Aug | 15.7 °C | 47 % | 53 km/h | 1.9 mm | Moderate 13 |
| 14 Aug | 15.3 °C | 37 % | 47 km/h | 0.7 mm | Low 10 |
| 15 Aug | 19.8 °C | 21 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 16 Aug | 21.6 °C | 22 % | 48 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 17 Aug | 22.8 °C | 19 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 18 Aug | 23.1 °C | 18 % | 55 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 19 Aug | 18.8 °C | 19 % | 50 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 20 Aug | 18.5 °C | 21 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 21 Aug | 20.7 °C | 20 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 22 Aug | 25.4 °C | 17 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 23 Aug | 25.5 °C | 16 % | 43 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 24 Aug | 19.3 °C | 27 % | 60 km/h | 1.3 mm | Moderate 18 |
| 25 Aug | 19.6 °C | 11 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 26 Aug | 22.3 °C | 15 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 27 Aug | 26.2 °C | 11 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 28 Aug | 26.9 °C | 11 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 38 |
| 29 Aug | 27.7 °C | 13 % | 36 km/h | 0.2 mm | Very high 44 |
| 30 Aug | 26.2 °C | 16 % | 44 km/h | 0.2 mm | Very high 40 |
| 31 Aug | 21.8 °C | 19 % | 55 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 54 |
| 1 Sept | 23.0 °C | 18 % | 54 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 50 |
| 2 Sept | 26.5 °C | 14 % | 53 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 3 Sept | 27.0 °C | 10 % | 48 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 4 Sept | 20.8 °C | 24 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 5 Sept | 22.2 °C | 16 % | 19 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 6 Sept | 24.8 °C | 15 % | 21 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 7 Sept | 26.3 °C | 16 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 38 |
| 8 Sept | 22.7 °C | 26 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 9 Sept | 21.9 °C | 29 % | 68 km/h | 1.6 mm | High 36 |
| 10 Sept | 17.4 °C | 24 % | 52 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 11 Sept | 21.9 °C | 14 % | 48 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 12 Sept | 21.1 °C | 18 % | 49 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 38 |
| 13 Sept | 15.5 °C | 21 % | 48 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 14 Sept | 6.2 °C | 50 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 15 Sept | 6.9 °C | 27 % | 41 km/h | 0.3 mm | High 26 |
| 16 Sept | 10.8 °C | 23 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 17 Sept | 13.4 °C | 20 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 18 Sept after | 7.5 °C | 49 % | 43 km/h | 10.6 mm | Very low 0 |
Its twins: fires that started in the same weather
It started with an FWI of 21.6, a minimum humidity of 26% and 3 days without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2016: 31.
FWI at the start
21.6
Minimum humidity
26 %
Days without rain
3
this fire
chosen twins
rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar
Outlines of the closest twins
This fire · Gibralter Ridge Fire, August 2017
2,548 ha
41 days
FWI 21.6
Min. humidity 26 %
Government Fire, September 2022
1,167 ha
21 days
FWI 25.7
Min. humidity 26 %
114 km away, in 2022
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 15.3 mm on 22 Sept.
Sterling Complex, August 2018
956 ha
20 days
FWI 25.3
Min. humidity 27 %
33 km away, in 2018
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 3.4 mm on 26 Aug.
Billiard Fire, September 2022
554 ha
21 days
FWI 25.1
Min. humidity 25 %
117 km away, in 2022
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 14.7 mm on 22 Sept.
Central Kootenay J fire, August 2018
3,112 ha
32 days
FWI 21.9
Min. humidity 28 %
226 km away, in 2018
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 4.6 mm on 12 Sept.
Lightning Creek Fire, July 2025
1,021 ha
7 days
FWI 20.1
Min. humidity 23 %
114 km away, in 2025
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 6.8 mm on 7 Aug.
What happened to them
- 21 days
- median duration
- 2,607 ha
- median area
- 81 %
- went past 1,000 ha
- 4.3 mm
- rain at the end (median; 30 of 31 had it)
It burned an area similar to its twins (2,548 ha against a median of 2,607 ha) and lasted 41 days, against 21 days.
In 1 of 31, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 4.3 mm.
This is a bank of analogues: it shows what usually happens, not what will happen. With fewer than 15 twins we give no figures. How we calculate it
How it ended
10.6 mmfirst rain
18 Septthe day after it ended
68km/h · max. gust
It was considered over on 17 Sept, and on 18 Sept 10.6 mm fell. We do not know whether the rain or the firefighters put it out. Twins with rain when they ended: 30 of 31, with a median of 4.3 mm.
Weather on this page: Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)
How a twin is chosen
- Same area: fires that have already ended, less than 250 km from this one, since 2016.
- Same start: we compare the FWI on the first day, the minimum humidity that day and the run of days without rain before it. The slider sets how much they may differ.
- Only pages with final weather data (ERA5 reanalysis) calculated in the same way as this fire’s; agricultural and grass burns and pages with data under review are left out.
- Fires burning at the same time as this one (a week before or after) are left out: they share the same spell of weather and do not count as a precedent.
- They are sorted by similarity, and the outlines of the first five are drawn.
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
↔
Before · 1 Aug 2017
After · 24 Sept 2017
Sentinel-2 did not pass over on that day. Try another date, or use false colour, which is daily.
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 · 559Every 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
- 1,596 haWeasel LincolnSeptember 2017 · 15 days · 15 km away
- 2,329 haWeasel FlatheadJuly 2022 · 45 days · 19 km away
- 1,088 haEast Kootenay AAugust 2022 · 19 days · 22 km away
- 1,093 haHay Creek FlatheadJuly 2021 · 17 days · 32 km away
- 956 haSterling Complex LincolnAugust 2018 · 20 days · 33 km away
- 2,254 haEast Fork FlatheadJuly 2023 · 7 days · 36 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Gibralter Ridge Fire last?
- The official perimeter only gives the start date (8 August 2017). The end comes from the heat detections inside the perimeter: it burned until 17 September 2017 (41 days from 8 August 2017), the last day with detections before more than 10 days in a row without any, so it is approximate.
- How much area did it burn?
- The official perimeter published by United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC) is 2,548 hectares (25.5 km²). Other tallies, such as daily incident reports, may give slightly different figures.
- Which counties burned?
- The fire only entered Lincoln (2,563 ha, 0.3 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 27.7 °C, humidity dropped to 10 % and gusts hit 68 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 54, 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.
- How did the fires that started in similar weather in this area end?
- Fires less than 250 km away that started since 2016 with a similar FWI, humidity and dry spell: 31. Their median duration was 21 days and their median area 2,607 ha; 81 % went past 1,000 ha. In 1 of 31, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 4.3 mm.
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 · Emergency number and official warnings
- NIFC · National Interagency Fire Center ↗
- InciWeb · Incident Information System ↗
- MTBS · Monitoring Trends in Burn Severity ↗
Satellite cross-check
History of this page Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
No changes since 24 October 2026.
RSS Changes to this page With cross-checks and a citable version
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
How we know this
- Perimeter: MTBS (US Geological Survey and US Forest Service), official.
- The official perimeter has no end date: the end is the last day with VIIRS detections inside the perimeter before a gap of more than 10 days (150 days at most), so it is approximate. 559 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.
- Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2015, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.
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.