Mapping the Fire Intensity Record for the United States (2000 through 2013)

  • Released Thursday, August 8th, 2013
  • Updated Friday, August 25th, 2023 at 12:04AM
  • ID: 4092
This visualization displays the MODIS Climate Modeling Grid (CMG) Mean Fire Radiative Power (FRP). The CMG fire products incorporate MODIS active fire data into gridded statistical summaries of fire pixel information intended for use in regional and global modeling. The products are currently generated at 0.5 degree spatial resolution. Many of the lower intensity fires shown in red were prescribed fires, lit for either agricultural or ecosystem management purposes. Orange indicates fires that were more intense with the most intense FRP being shown in yellow. Most of these intense fires occurred in the western United States, where lightning and human activity often sparks blazes that firefighters cannot contain.

This visual shows the Mean Fire Radiative Power (FRP) from the MODIS Climate Modeling Grid fire products. Agricultural and prescribed fires are shown in dark red. More intense fires are shown in orange. Regions where the gridded statistical summaries show the most intense fires are shown in bright yellow.
This video is also available on our YouTube channel.

This visual shows the same Mean Fire Radiative Power (FRP) from the MODIS Climate Modeling Grid fire products without the accompanying text and labels.

Colorbar for Fire Intensity as defined by Mean Fire Radiative Power

Colorbar for Fire Intensity as defined by Mean Fire Radiative Power

This sequence of frames contains only the matching labels and colorbar text.

This image shows grid cells where the mean FRP is low between 20 and 27 megawatts.

This image shows grid cells where the mean FRP is low between 20 and 27 megawatts.

This image shows grid cells where the mean FRP is low between 28 and 33 megawatts.

This image shows grid cells where the mean FRP is low between 28 and 33 megawatts.

This image shows grid cells where the mean FRP is between 34 and 41 megawatts.

This image shows grid cells where the mean FRP is between 34 and 41 megawatts.

This image shows grid cells where the mean FRP is between 42 and 49 megawatts.

This image shows grid cells where the mean FRP is between 42 and 49 megawatts.

This image shows grid cells where the mean FRP is high between 51 and 69 megawatts.

This image shows grid cells where the mean FRP is high between 51 and 69 megawatts.

This image shows grid cells where the mean FRP is very high between 70 and 89 megawatts.

This image shows grid cells where the mean FRP is very high between 70 and 89 megawatts.

This image shows grid cells where the mean FRP is the highest where all values are greater then 90 megawatts.

This image shows grid cells where the mean FRP is the highest where all values are greater then 90 megawatts.

Credits

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

Papers

This visualization is based on the following papers:
  • Giglio, L., I. Csiszar, and C. O. Justice (2006), Global distribution and seasonality of active fires as observed with the Terra and Aqua Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) sensors, J. Geophys. Res., 111, G02016, doi:10.1029/2005JG000142.

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 CMG (A.K.A. MODIS Climate Modeling Grid) (Collected with the MODIS sensor)
Data Compilation November 2000 through June 2013
See more visualizations using this data set

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.