Boreal Forest Fire Observations and MODIS NDVI

  • Released Tuesday, October 18th, 2011
  • Updated Sunday, November 12th, 2023 at 10:04PM
  • ID: 3869

NASA has released a series of new visualizations that show the locations of the millions of fires detected by key fire-monitoring instruments on NASA satellites over the last decade. This visualization shows fire observations made by the MODerate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) instruments on board the Terra and Aqua satellites in Europe and Asia from July 2002 through July 2011. "It's incredibly satisfying to see such a long record of fires visualized," said Chris Justice, a scientist from the University of Maryland who leads NASA's effort to use MODIS data to study the world's fires. "It's not only exciting visually, but what you see here is a very good representation of the data scientists use to understand the global distribution of fires and to determine where and how fires are responding to climate change and population growth."

More information on the Fire Information for Resource Management System (FIRMS) is available at https://earthdata.nasa.gov/earth-observation-data/near-real-time/firms.

This animation shows fires over NDVI in the Boreal region in Eurasia from July 2002 through July 2011. This still image is from August 15, 2006.
This video is also available on our YouTube channel.

Colortable showing MODIS fire pixels. The number colorized is MODIS MCD14ML T21 Brightness temperature minus the T31 Brightness temperature.

Colortable showing MODIS fire pixels. The number colorized is MODIS MCD14ML T21 Brightness temperature minus the T31 Brightness temperature.

Colortable showing MODIS' 16 Day Composite NDVI

Colortable showing MODIS' 16 Day Composite NDVI

Active fires and vegetation index for July 15, 2002.

Active fires and vegetation index for July 15, 2002.

Active fires and vegetation index for September 15, 2002.

Active fires and vegetation index for September 15, 2002.

Active fires and vegetation index for December 15, 2002.

Active fires and vegetation index for December 15, 2002.

Active fires and vegetation index for March 15, 2003.

Active fires and vegetation index for March 15, 2003.

Active fires and vegetation index for July 15, 2003.

Active fires and vegetation index for July 15, 2003.

Active fires and vegetation index for September 15, 2003.

Active fires and vegetation index for September 15, 2003.

Active fires and vegetation index for December 15, 2003.

Active fires and vegetation index for December 15, 2003.

Active fires and vegetation index for March 15, 2004.

Active fires and vegetation index for March 15, 2004.

Active fires and vegetation index for July 15, 2004.

Active fires and vegetation index for July 15, 2004.

Active fires and vegetation index for September 15, 2004.

Active fires and vegetation index for September 15, 2004.

Active fires and vegetation index for December 15, 2004.

Active fires and vegetation index for December 15, 2004.

Active fires and vegetation index for March 15, 2005.

Active fires and vegetation index for March 15, 2005.

Active fires and vegetation index for July 15, 2005.

Active fires and vegetation index for July 15, 2005.

Active fires and vegetation index for September 15, 2005.

Active fires and vegetation index for September 15, 2005.

Active fires and vegetation index for December 15, 2005.

Active fires and vegetation index for December 15, 2005.

Active fires and vegetation index for March 15, 2006.

Active fires and vegetation index for March 15, 2006.

Active fires and vegetation index for July 15, 2006.

Active fires and vegetation index for July 15, 2006.

Active fires and vegetation index for September 15, 2006.

Active fires and vegetation index for September 15, 2006.

Active fires and vegetation index for December 15, 2006.

Active fires and vegetation index for December 15, 2006.

Active fires and vegetation index for March 15, 2007.

Active fires and vegetation index for March 15, 2007.

Active fires and vegetation index for July 15, 2007.

Active fires and vegetation index for July 15, 2007.

Active fires and vegetation index for September 15, 2007.

Active fires and vegetation index for September 15, 2007.

Active fires and vegetation index for December 15, 2007.

Active fires and vegetation index for December 15, 2007.

Active fires and vegetation index for March 15, 2008.

Active fires and vegetation index for March 15, 2008.

Active fires and vegetation index for July 15, 2008.

Active fires and vegetation index for July 15, 2008.

Active fires and vegetation index for September 15, 2008.

Active fires and vegetation index for September 15, 2008.

Active fires and vegetation index for December 15, 2008.

Active fires and vegetation index for December 15, 2008.

Active fires and vegetation index for March 15, 2009.

Active fires and vegetation index for March 15, 2009.

Active fires and vegetation index for July 15, 2009.

Active fires and vegetation index for July 15, 2009.

Active fires and vegetation index for September 15, 2009.

Active fires and vegetation index for September 15, 2009.

Active fires and vegetation index for December 15, 2009.

Active fires and vegetation index for December 15, 2009.

Active fires and vegetation index for March 15, 2010.

Active fires and vegetation index for March 15, 2010.

Active fires and vegetation index for July 15, 2010.

Active fires and vegetation index for July 15, 2010.

Active fires and vegetation index for September 15, 2010.

Active fires and vegetation index for September 15, 2010.

Active fires and vegetation index for December 15, 2010.

Active fires and vegetation index for December 15, 2010.

Active fires and vegetation index for March 15, 2011.

Active fires and vegetation index for March 15, 2011.

Active fires and vegetation index for July 15, 2011.

Active fires and vegetation index for July 15, 2011.

Credits

Please give credit for this item to:
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio

Missions

This visualization is related to the following missions:

Series

This visualization can be found in the following series:

Datasets used in this visualization

  • Terra and Aqua NDVI (Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI))

    ID: 633
    Collected with MODIS NASA
    See all pages that use this dataset

  • Terra and Aqua Fire Location

    ID: 496
    Collected with MODIS

    Credit: Fire location data courtesy of MODIS Rapid Response Project (NASA/GSFC and University of Maryland - http://rapidfire.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov)

    See all pages that use this dataset

Note: While we identify the data sets used in these visualizations, we do not store any further details, nor the data sets themselves on our site.