De Luz wildfire at Camp Pendleton in southern California
GOES-13 0.63 µm visible channel images (click to play animation)
The “De Luz” wildfire began to burn at the Camp Pendleton Marine Corps Base in southern California around 19:45 UTC or 12:45 PM on 05 October 2013. The fire burned over 2200 acres and forced evacuations of some housing and a hospital (InciWeb). McIDAS images of GOES-13 (GOES-East) 0.63 µm visible channel data (above; click image to play animation) showed the smoke plume as it drifted quickly southwestward due to strong Santa Ana winds.
A 2-panel comparison of GOES-13 0.63 µm visible channel and 3.9 µm shortwave IR channel images (below; click image to play animation) revealed that the fire “hot spot” (red color enhancement on the shortwave IR images) was detected about 30 minutes prior to the time when a smoke plume became obvious on the visible images.
GOES-13 0.63 µm visible (left panel) and 3.9 µm shortwave IR (right panel) images (click to play animation)
The fire growth slowed that evening as temperatures began to cool down and the strong Santa Ana winds gradually subsided, but fire continued to burn into the night — a small fire hot spot (yellow to orange color enhancement) was still evident on a Suomi NPP VIIRS 3.74 µm shortwave IR channel image at 09:18 UTC or 2:18 AM local time (below).
