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Wildfires in Southern California

By Scott Bachmeier •

GOES-17 “Red” Visible (0.64 µm) and Shortwave Infrared (3.9 µm) images [click to play animation | MP4]

GOES-17 “Red” Visible (0.64 µm) and Shortwave Infrared (3.9 µm) images [click to play animation | MP4]

As discussed on the Satellite Liaison Blog, wildfires driven by strong Santa Ana winds developed after sunset on 02 December — and 1-minute Mesoscale Domain Sector GOES-17 (GOES-West) “Red” Visible (0.64 µm) and Shortwave Infrared (3.9 µm) images (above) displayed the thermal anomalies and smoke plumes associated with larger fires that persisted into the subsequent daytime hours on 03 December 2020.

GOES-17 True Color Red-Green-Blue (RGB) images created using Geo2Grid (below) showed the offshore transport of wildfire smoke during the day.

GOES-17 True Color RGB images [click to play animation | MP4]

GOES-17 True Color RGB images [click to play animation | MP4]

A before (24 November) / after (03 December) comparison of 30-meter resolution Landsat-8 False Color RGB images viewed using RealEarth (below) revealed the appearance of burn scars (darker shades of brown), active fire fronts (brighter shades of pink) and smoke plumes (shades of gray) associated with the Bond Fire east of Santa Ana and the smaller Airport Fire northwest of Corona.

Landsat-8 False Color images, 24 November vs 03 December 2020 [click to enlarge]

Landsat-8 False Color RGB images, 24 November vs 03 December 2020 [click to enlarge]

Categories: Fire detection, GOES-17, Landsat, Red-Green-Blue (RGB) images