{"id":71861,"date":"2026-08-17T23:59:00","date_gmt":"2026-08-17T23:59:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/?p=71861"},"modified":"2026-08-20T02:21:46","modified_gmt":"2026-08-20T02:21:46","slug":"mukluk-fire-near-tok-alaska-forces-evacuations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/archives\/71861","title":{"rendered":"Mukluk Fire near Tok, Alaska forces evacuations"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-video aligncenter\"><video autoplay controls loop muted src=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2026\/08\/260817_g18_rgb_ngfs_MuklukFire_AK.mov\" playsinline><\/video><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\"><em>10-minute GOES-18 GeoColor RGB images with an overlay of NGFS Fire Detection polygons and surface observations, 1900 UTC on 17 August to 0420 UTC on 18 August<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">10-minute Full Disk scan GOES-18 <em>(GOES-West)<\/em> GeoColor RGB images with an overlay of <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/ngfs\/\">Next Generation Fire System<\/a><\/strong> (NGFS) Fire Detection polygons <strong><em>(above)<\/em><\/strong> showed the thermal signature associated with the <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/app.watchduty.org\/i\/115411\">Mukluk Fire<\/a><\/strong> near Tok, Alaska &#8212; which began around <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2026\/08\/260817_1940utc_g18_rgb_ngfs_MuklukFire_AK.png\">1940 UTC<\/a><\/strong> on 17 August 2026. With winds at Tok gusting to 20-30 mph, the fire spread quickly and forced some <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/akfireinfo.com\/2026\/08\/17\/evacuations-underway-for-mukluk-fire-west-of-tok\/?fbclid=IwY2xjawTwUytwZG9mBWV4dG4DYWVtAjExAGJyaWQRMVk0QXlrejR2bThJMm9vMjNzcnRjBmFwcF9pZBAyMjIwMzkxNzg4MjAwODkyAAEeQnUucjjQsjpqO0RBs8V4ud_spl6W5w5jO4VAe-lZ6NlMaqZtUdlWDLx8KiI_aem_LFUON8Kzo27mCylEjxaDdw\">evacuations<\/a><\/strong> in the Tok area (<strong><a href=\"https:\/\/akfireinfo.com\/2026\/08\/18\/evacuations-remain-in-place-for-mukluk-fire-in-tok\/\">18 August update<\/a><\/strong>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">10-minute GOES-18 Visible images with an overlay of the Fire Mask derived product <strong><em>(below)<\/em><\/strong> provided another view of the fire&#8217;s thermal signature.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-video aligncenter\"><video autoplay controls loop muted src=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2026\/08\/260817_g18_vis_fireMask_MuklukFire_Tok_AK.mov\" playsinline><\/video><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\"><em>10-minute GOES-18 Visible images with an overlay of the Fire Mask derived product, from 1840 UTC on 17 August to 0140 UTC on 18 August<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The areal coverage of NGFS Fire Detection polygons was somewhat distorted in GOES-18 imagery, due to the large effective pixel size of the spectral bands used to create the NGFS product (as shown in a plot of <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2017\/01\/goes_ir_pixel_size_vs_zenith_angle.jpeg\">pixel size vs. satellite viewing angle<\/a><\/strong>; the GOES-18 viewing angle or zenith angle for Tok is around 72 degrees). Polar-orbiting satellites such as NOAA-20 and NOAA-21 flew directly over Alaska as the Mukluk Fire was burning, and offered a more accurate mapping of the fire&#8217;s thermal signature <strong><em>(below)<\/em><\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><a href=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2026\/08\/260817_2215utc_noaa21_viirs_rgb_ngfs_Tok.png\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2026\/08\/260817_2215utc_noaa21_viirs_rgb_ngfs_Tok.png\" alt=\"\"\/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\"><em>NOAA-21 VIIRS GeoColor RGB image with overlay of NGFS Fire Detection polygons at 2215 UTC on 17 August [click to enlarge]<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large\"><a href=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2026\/08\/260817_2312utc_noaa20_viirs_rgb_ngfs_Tok.png\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2026\/08\/260817_2312utc_noaa20_viirs_rgb_ngfs_Tok.png\" alt=\"\"\/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\"><em>NOAA-20 VIIRS GeoColor RGB image with an overlay of NGFS Fire Detection polygons at 2312 UTC on 17 August [click to enlarge]<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>10-minute Full Disk scan GOES-18 (GOES-West) GeoColor RGB images with an overlay of Next Generation Fire System (NGFS) Fire Detection polygons (above) showed the thermal signature associated with the Mukluk Fire near Tok, Alaska &#8212; which began around 1940 UTC on 17 August 2026. With winds at Tok gusting to 20-30 mph, the fire spread [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":71876,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,114,158,78,131,48],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-71861","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fire-detection","category-goes-18","category-ngfs","category-noaa-20","category-noaa-21","category-viirs"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71861","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=71861"}],"version-history":[{"count":21,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71861\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":71927,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71861\/revisions\/71927"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/71876"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=71861"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=71861"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=71861"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}