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Range 12 Fire, July 2016 Yakima, Benton

Out · last detection 1 Aug 2016, 20:36 UTC

The fire started on 31 July 2016 in Yakima, United States, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC) mapped an official burnt perimeter of 67,867 hectares, spread across 2 counties.

It is the 4th largest in Washington since 2016 (of 285 with a page). Number 3 in United States in 2016, of 475.

Burnt area
67,867ha
official perimeter (MTBS / NIFC)
Duration
1day
31 Jul 2016 – 31 Jul 2016
Municipalities hit
2
counties
Started on
31 Jul
2016
Heat detections
1,058
in a single hotspot: 128 MW
Danger at start
54
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
9.1GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

1 Aug 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 31 Jul31 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

311

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

The weather it burned in

29°high
43km/h · peak gust
14%lowest humidity

It had gone 42 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Yakima where it started
    43,335 ha reached on 31 Jul
    3.9 %
  2. Benton
    24,461 ha reached on 31 Jul
    5.4 %

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)
31 Jul 28.4 °C 14 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
1 Aug after 29.4 °C 14 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
2 Aug after 23.8 °C 20 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
3 Aug after 27.0 °C 20 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
4 Aug after 29.4 °C 15 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
5 Aug after 32.7 °C 11 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
6 Aug after 28.1 °C 10 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
7 Aug after 25.4 °C 18 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
8 Aug after 21.3 °C 26 % 38 km/h 0.3 mm Very high 39
9 Aug after 22.7 °C 25 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
10 Aug after 25.9 °C 26 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
11 Aug after 28.8 °C 23 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 35

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 24 Jul 2016
After · 7 Aug 2016

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 · 1,058Every 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 Range 12 fire last?
It burned between 31 July 2016 and 31 July 2016: 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 67,867 hectares (678.7 km²). Other tallies, such as daily incident reports, may give slightly different figures.
Which counties burned?
The fire entered 2 counties: Yakima (43,335 ha, 3.9 %); Benton (24,461 ha, 5.4 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 29.4 °C, humidity dropped to 14 % and gusts hit 43 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.

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.