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Mccormick Fire, August 2017 Alpine, Tuolumne

Out · last measured on 19 Aug 2017

The fire started on 19 August 2017 in Alpine, United States, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC) mapped an official burnt perimeter of 1,779 hectares, spread across 2 counties.

It is the 222th largest in California since 2016 (of 442 with a page). Number 277 in United States in 2017, of 619.

Burnt area
1,779ha
official perimeter (MTBS / NIFC)
Duration
1day
19 Aug 2017 – 19 Aug 2017
Municipalities hit
2
counties
Started on
19 Aug
2017
Heat detections
388
in a single hotspot: 248 MW
Danger at start
16
Moderate · FWI index

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 19 Aug19 Aug

The weather it burned in

29°high
57km/h · peak gust
13%lowest humidity

It had gone 2 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 4.6 mm on 6 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. Alpine where it started
    1,415 ha reached on 24 Aug
    0.7 %
  2. Tuolumne
    352 ha reached on 29 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)
19 Aug 23.6 °C 21 % 36 km/h 1.1 mm Moderate 16
20 Aug after 24.2 °C 19 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
21 Aug after 22.5 °C 17 % 37 km/h 1.9 mm Low 11
22 Aug after 21.0 °C 34 % 38 km/h 2.3 mm Low 5
23 Aug after 23.0 °C 30 % 29 km/h 0.1 mm Moderate 13
24 Aug after 24.6 °C 24 % 42 km/h 0.1 mm High 24
25 Aug after 24.6 °C 27 % 40 km/h 2.1 mm Low 10
26 Aug after 25.0 °C 26 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
27 Aug after 26.0 °C 21 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
28 Aug after 27.6 °C 15 % 55 km/h 0.1 mm High 36
29 Aug after 26.8 °C 20 % 42 km/h 0.6 mm High 32
30 Aug after 23.5 °C 24 % 57 km/h 3.5 mm Low 9
31 Aug after 25.4 °C 19 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
1 Sept after 26.5 °C 18 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
2 Sept after 28.7 °C 14 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
3 Sept after 28.1 °C 13 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
4 Sept after 25.4 °C 18 % 49 km/h 0.5 mm High 35
5 Sept after 25.2 °C 21 % 41 km/h 1.1 mm High 21
6 Sept after 21.4 °C 41 % 41 km/h 4.6 mm Very low 3

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 12 Aug 2017
After · 26 Aug 2017

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 · 388Every 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 Mccormick fire last?
It burned between 19 August 2017 and 19 August 2017: 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 1,779 hectares (17.8 km²). Other tallies, such as daily incident reports, may give slightly different figures.
Which counties burned?
The fire entered 2 counties: Alpine (1,415 ha, 0.7 %); Tuolumne (352 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 28.7 °C, humidity dropped to 13 % and gusts hit 57 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 36, 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.

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.