Unit 1 Fire, September 2022 Jefferson
The fire started on 1 September 2022 in Jefferson, United States, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC) mapped an official burnt perimeter of 1,989 hectares, spread across a single county.
It is the 91th largest in Texas since 2016 (of 327 with a page). Number 207 in United States in 2022, of 493.
- Burnt area
- 1,989ha
- official perimeter (MTBS / NIFC)
- Duration
- 2days
- 1 Sept 2022 – 2 Sept 2022
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- counties
- Started on
- 1 Sept
- 2022
- Heat detections
- 49
- in a single hotspot: 274 MW
- Danger at start
- 0
- Very low · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 1.6GW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
2 Sept 2022 · 1,604 MW · 49
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone one day without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 17.5 mm on 3 Sept.
This area had burned before
54% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,067 ha in 2017, 15 ha in 2021.
- 1,065 ha Wf Perkins Blowout fire, October 2017 3,093 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 15 ha Holdover fire, July 2021 1,917 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2 ha Unit 12 Afternoon Fire fire, July 2017 709 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Jefferson where it started1,991 ha reached on 2 Sept0.8 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 Sept | 31.6 °C | 65 % | 19 km/h | 5.1 mm | Very low 0 |
| 2 Sept | 31.1 °C | 69 % | 25 km/h | 4.1 mm | Very low 0 |
| 3 Sept after | 27.6 °C | 79 % | 17 km/h | 17.5 mm | Very low 0 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
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 · CopernicusOn 3 September 2022 the air beside the fire reached 49 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 28: 1.8 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
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 · 49Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 3,093 haWf Perkins Blowout JeffersonOctober 2017 · 2 days · 3 km away
- 1,917 haHoldover JeffersonJuly 2021 · 2 days · 5 km away
- 1,671 haUnit 12 Middle JeffersonSeptember 2026 · 13 days · 5 km away
- 1,389 haWidgeon JeffersonNovember 2022 · 2 days · 12 km away
- 3,932 haMud Bayou ChambersSeptember 2026 · 7 days · 13 km away
- 3,834 haH And H Complex JeffersonOctober 2023 · 12 days · 26 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Unit 1 fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 1 September 2022 to 2 September 2022 (2 days). The perimeter dates it from 1 September 2022 to 1 September 2022.
- How much area did it burn?
- The official perimeter published by United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC) is 1,989 hectares (19.9 km²). Other tallies, such as daily incident reports, may give slightly different figures.
- Which counties burned?
- The fire only entered Jefferson (1,991 ha, 0.8 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 31.6 °C, humidity dropped to 65 % and gusts hit 25 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 0, class Very low.
- 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
- NIFC · National Interagency Fire Center ↗
- InciWeb · Incident Information System ↗
- MTBS · Monitoring Trends in Burn Severity ↗
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.
Report an error
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.