Prescribed burn in Wisconsin

By Scott Bachmeier • 28 November 2017

GOES-16 Visible (0.64 µm, left) and Shortwave Infrared (3.9 µm, right) images, with plots of hourly surface reports [click to play MP4 animation]

GOES-16 “Red” Visible (0.64 µm) and Shortwave Infrared (3.9 µm) images (above; also available as an animated GIF) showed signatures associated with a prescribed burn in western Wisconsin on 28 November 2017. The Shortwave Infrared images revealed a warm thermal anomaly or “hot spot” (dark black to yellow to red pixels) — and on the visible images, a thin smoke plume could be seen drifting southeastward from the fire source.

Early in the animation sequence, however, a band of cirrus cloud was moving over the fire — yet a faint thermal signature (darker gray to black pixels) could occasionally be seen on the Shortwave Infrared imagery. The cirrus cloud layer was thin enough to allow some of the heat energy emitted by the fire to pass through and reach the satellite detectors. Once the cirrus moved to the south, the fire’s hot spot became much more apparent.

A toggle between Terra MODIS Shortwave Infrared (3.7µm) and Infrared Window (11.0 µm) images at 1812 UTC (below) also showed a faint warm fire signature through the cirrus clouds — the cloud-top Infrared Window brightness temperature directly over the fire in northern Monroe County was -33ºC, while the warmest Shortwave Infrared brightness temperature of the subtle fire signature was +1ºC.

Terra MODIS Shortwave Infrared (3.7 µm) and Infrared Window (11.0 µm) images [click to enlarge]

Aqua MODIS Shortwave Infrared (3.7 µm) image [click to enlarge]

Categories: Aqua, Fire detection, GOES-16, MODIS, Terra