How long did the Thompson fire last?

It burned between 23 July 2024 and 23 July 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 12,563 hectares (125.6 km²). Other tallies, such as daily incident reports, may give slightly different figures.

Which counties burned?

The fire only entered Baker (12,540 ha, 1.6 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 35.4 °C, humidity dropped to 16 % and gusts hit 35 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 44, class Very 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.

US · United States · 2024-07-23 → 2024-07-23

Thompson Fire, July 2024 Baker

Out · last detection 23 Jul 2024, 21:57 UTC

The fire started on 23 July 2024 in Baker, United States, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC) mapped an official burnt perimeter of 12,563 hectares, spread across a single county.

It is the 62th largest in Oregon since 2016 (of 327 with a page). Number 38 in United States in 2024, of 371.

Burnt area: 12,563ha; official perimeter (MTBS / NIFC)
Duration: 1day; 23 Jul 2024 – 23 Jul 2024
Municipalities hit: 1; counties
Started on: 23 Jul; 2024
Heat detections: 493; in a single hotspot: 521 MW
Danger at start: 44; Very high · FWI index
Energy released: 16.3GW; sum of detected power

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 23 Jul23 Jul

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

35°high

35km/h · peak gust

16%lowest humidity

It had gone 0 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 2.2 mm on 30 Jul.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

Baker where it started

12,540 ha reached on 23 Jul

1.6 %

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)
23 Jul	35.4 °C	16 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
24 Jul after	35.5 °C	16 %	62 km/h	0.7 mm	Extreme 51
25 Jul after	29.1 °C	23 %	55 km/h	0.2 mm	Extreme 51
26 Jul after	27.2 °C	20 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
27 Jul after	28.4 °C	20 %	29 km/h	0.3 mm	Very high 43
28 Jul after	29.3 °C	15 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
29 Jul after	28.7 °C	19 %	58 km/h	0.3 mm	Extreme 51
30 Jul after	26.1 °C	28 %	32 km/h	2.2 mm	Moderate 14

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 16 Jul 2024

After · 30 Jul 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 24 July 2024 the air beside the fire reached 131 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 74: 4.9 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak131 µg/m³

Days over the guideline4 days

PM10189 µg/m³

Optical depth2.38

WHO 15

212223242526

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 · 493Every 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 Thompson fire last?: It burned between 23 July 2024 and 23 July 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 12,563 hectares (125.6 km²). Other tallies, such as daily incident reports, may give slightly different figures.
Which counties burned?: The fire only entered Baker (12,540 ha, 1.6 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 35.4 °C, humidity dropped to 16 % and gusts hit 35 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 44, class Very 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

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.

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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