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Jones Road Wildfire in eastern New Jersey: FDCA vs NGFS

By Scott Bachmeier •

1-minute GOES-19 Visible images with an overlay of the GOES-19 Fire Mask derived product, from 1600-2259 UTC on 22 April; Highways are plotted in dotted magenta [click to play MP4 animation]

1-minute Mesoscale Domain Sector GOES-19 (GOES-East) Visible images with an overlay of the Fire Detection and Characterization Algorithm (FDCA) Fire Mask derived product (above) displayed the rapid growth and movement of the Jones Road Wildfire in eastern New Jersey on 22 April 2025. The initial FDCA fire detection from GOES-19 occurred at 1616 UTC. In addition, the maximum 3.9 µm brightness temperature reached 133.77ºC (the saturation temperature of GOES-19 ABI Band 7 detectors) for several minutes beginning at 2109 UTC. Just north of the wildfire, westerly winds at Tom River (KMJX) occasionally gusted to 18 kts (21 mph), which likely played a role in the rapid eastward run of the fire toward the Garden State Parkway (which was closed to traffic for most of the following overnight hours). Note that the dense cirrus clouds drifting over the area occasionally attenuated the fire signature enough to prevent Fire Mask detections.

In contrast, the more sensitive GOES-19 Next Generation Fire System (NGFS) (below) consistently displayed a fire signature every minute during the same 7-hour period as the FDCA shown above. The initial NGFS fire detection occurred at 1617 UTC.

1-minute GOES-19 GeoColor RGB images with an overlay of GOES-19 NGFS Fire Detection polygons, from 1600-2259 UTC on 22 April [click to play MP4 animation]

Categories: Fire detection, GOES-19, NGFS