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Smoke and Fires in Montana and Wyoming

NASA's Terra satellite passed over the U.S. west and captured an image of heat from several fires and their plumes of smoke over Montana, Wyoming and South Dakota.

The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) instrument onboard Terra has infrared capabilities that can detect heat from the various wildfires. The image was captured on July 1, 2012 at 17:30 UTC (1:30 p.m. EDT). In the MODIS images, fires, or hot spots are color coded as red areas in imagery and smoke appears in light brown. Images are generated at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.

The Ash Creek Complex Fire is located in the Custer National Forest in eastern Montana . As of July 2, it had burned 170,000 acres and was 40 percent contained. In Wyoming the Fontenelle Fire and Arapho Fires are evident on the NASA imagery. The smoke from the Fontenelle Fire was blowing in a north-northeasterly direction on the satellite image. This fire has consumed 47,478 acres and according to the U.S. Forest Service it located in Lincoln and Sublette County, Wyoming. The Arapaho Fire has consumed 75,051 acres and is only 5 percent contained, according to inciweb.org.

For a higher resolution image, visit: http://lance-modis.eosdis.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/imagery/single.cgi?image=Wyoming.A2012183.2045.1km.jpg.

Image: Jeff Schmaltz, NASA Goddard MODIS Rapid Response Team
Caption: Rob Gutro, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center