Fire

Global Map Fire Image 1 Global Map Fire Image 2 Global Map Fire Image 3 Global Map Fire Image 4 Global Map Fire Image 5 Global Map Fire Image 6 Global Map Fire Image 7 Global Map Fire Image 8 Global Map Fire Image 9 Global Map Fire Image 10 Global Map Fire Image 11 Global Map Fire Image 12 Global Map Fire Image 13 Global Map Fire Image 14 Global Map Fire Image 15 Global Map Fire Image 16 Global Map Fire Image 17 Global Map Fire Image 18 Global Map Fire Image 19 Global Map Fire Image 20 Global Map Fire Image 21 Global Map Fire Image 22 Global Map Fire Image 23 Global Map Fire Image 24 Global Map Fire Image 25 Global Map Fire Image 26 Global Map Fire Image 27 Global Map Fire Image 28 Global Map Fire Image 29 Global Map Fire Image 30 Global Map Fire Image 31 Global Map Fire Image 32 Global Map Fire Image 33 Global Map Fire Image 34 Global Map Fire Image 35 Global Map Fire Image 36 Global Map Fire Image 37 Global Map Fire Image 38 Global Map Fire Image 39 Global Map Fire Image 40 Global Map Fire Image 41 Global Map Fire Image 42 Global Map Fire Image 43 Global Map Fire Image 44 Global Map Fire Image 45 Global Map Fire Image 46 Global Map Fire Image 47 Global Map Fire Image 48 Global Map Fire Image 49 Global Map Fire Image 50 Global Map Fire Image 51 Global Map Fire Image 52 Global Map Fire Image 53 Global Map Fire Image 54 Global Map Fire Image 55 Global Map Fire Image 56 Global Map Fire Image 57 Global Map Fire Image 58 Global Map Fire Image 59 Global Map Fire Image 60 Global Map Fire Image 61 Global Map Fire Image 62 Global Map Fire Image 63 Global Map Fire Image 64 Global Map Fire Image 65 Global Map Fire Image 66 Global Map Fire Image 67 Global Map Fire Image 68 Global Map Fire Image 69 Global Map Fire Image 70 Global Map Fire Image 71 Global Map Fire Image 72 Global Map Fire Image 73 Global Map Fire Image 74 Global Map Fire Image 75 Global Map Fire Image 76 Global Map Fire Image 77 Global Map Fire Image 78 Global Map Fire Image 79 Global Map Fire Image 80 Global Map Fire Image 81 Global Map Fire Image 82 Global Map Fire Image 83 Global Map Fire Image 84 Global Map Fire Image 85 Global Map Fire Image 86 Global Map Fire Image 87 Global Map Fire Image 88 Global Map Fire Image 89 Global Map Fire Image 90 Global Map Fire Image 91 Global Map Fire Image 92 Global Map Fire Image 93 Global Map Fire Image 94 Global Map Fire Image 95 Global Map Fire Image 96 Global Map Fire Image 97 Global Map Fire Image 98 Global Map Fire Image 99 Global Map Fire Image 100 Global Map Fire Image 101 Global Map Fire Image 102 Global Map Fire Image 103 Global Map Fire Image 104 Global Map Fire Image 105 Global Map Fire Image 106 Global Map Fire Image 107 Global Map Fire Image 108 Global Map Fire Image 109 Global Map Fire Image 110 Global Map Fire Image 111 Global Map Fire Image 112 Global Map Fire Image 113 Global Map Fire Image 114 Global Map Fire Image 115 Global Map Fire Image 116 Global Map Fire Image 117 Global Map Fire Image 118 Global Map Fire Image 119 Global Map Fire Image 120 Global Map Fire Image 121 Global Map Fire Image 122 Global Map Fire Image 123 Global Map Fire Image 124 Global Map Fire Image 125 Global Map Fire Image 126 Global Map Fire Image 127 Global Map Fire Image 128 Global Map Fire Image 129 Global Map Fire Image 130 Global Map Fire Image 131 Global Map Fire Image 132 Global Map Fire Image 133 Global Map Fire Image 134 Global Map Fire Image 135 Global Map Fire Image 136 Global Map Fire Image 137 Global Map Fire Image 138 Global Map Fire Image 139 Global Map Fire Image 140 Global Map Fire Image 141 Global Map Fire Image 142 Global Map Fire Image 143 Global Map Fire Image 144 Global Map Fire Image 145 Global Map Fire Image 146 Global Map Fire Image 147 Global Map Fire Image 148 Global Map Fire Image 149 Global Map Fire Image 150 Global Map Fire Image 151 Global Map Fire Image 152 Global Map Fire Image 153 Global Map Fire Image 154 Global Map Fire Image 155 Global Map Fire Image 156 Global Map Fire Image 157 Global Map Fire Image 158 Global Map Fire Image 159 Global Map Fire Image 160 Global Map Fire Image 161 Global Map Fire Image 162 Global Map Fire Image 163 Global Map Fire Image 164 Global Map Fire Image 165 Global Map Fire Image 166 Global Map Fire Image 167 Global Map Fire Image 168 Global Map Fire Image 169 Global Map Fire Image 170 Global Map Fire Image 171 Global Map Fire Image 172 Global Map Fire Image 173 Global Map Fire Image 174 Global Map Fire Image 175 Global Map Fire Image 176 Global Map Fire Image 177 Global Map Fire Image 178 Global Map Fire Image 179 Global Map Fire Image 180 Global Map Fire Image 181 Global Map Fire Image 182 Global Map Fire Image 183 Global Map Fire Image 184 Global Map Fire Image 185 Global Map Fire Image 186 Global Map Fire Image 187 Global Map Fire Image 188 Global Map Fire Image 189 Global Map Fire Image 190 Global Map Fire Image 191 Global Map Fire Image 192 Global Map Fire Image 193 Global Map Fire Image 194 Global Map Fire Image 195 Global Map Fire Image 196 Global Map Fire Image 197 Global Map Fire Image 198 Global Map Fire Image 199 Global Map Fire Image 200 Global Map Fire Image 201 Global Map Fire Image 202 Global Map Fire Image 203 Global Map Fire Image 204 Global Map Fire Image 205 Global Map Fire Image 206 Global Map Fire Image 207 Global Map Fire Image 208 Global Map Fire Image 209 Global Map Fire Image 210 Global Map Fire Image 211 Global Map Fire Image 212 Global Map Fire Image 213 Global Map Fire Image 214 Global Map Fire Image 215 Global Map Fire Image 216 Global Map Fire Image 217 Global Map Fire Image 218 Global Map Fire Image 219 Global Map Fire Image 220 Global Map Fire Image 221 Global Map Fire Image 222 Global Map Fire Image 223 Global Map Fire Image 224 Global Map Fire Image 225 Global Map Fire Image 226 Global Map Fire Image 227 Global Map Fire Image 228 Global Map Fire Image 229 Global Map Fire Image 230 Global Map Fire Image 231 Global Map Fire Image 232 Global Map Fire Image 233 Global Map Fire Image 234 Global Map Fire Image 235 Global Map Fire Image 236 Global Map Fire Image 237 Global Map Fire Image 238 Global Map Fire Image 239 Global Map Fire Image 240 Global Map Fire Image 241 Global Map Fire Image 242 Global Map Fire Image 243 Global Map Fire Image 244 Global Map Fire Image 245 Global Map Fire Image 246 Global Map Fire Image 247 Global Map Fire Image 248 Global Map Fire Image 249 Global Map Fire Image 250 Global Map Fire Image 251 Global Map Fire Image 252 Global Map Fire Image 253 Global Map Fire Image 254 Global Map Fire Image 255 Global Map Fire Image 256 Global Map Fire Image 257 Global Map Fire Image 258 Global Map Fire Image 259 Global Map Fire Image 260 Global Map Fire Image 261 Global Map Fire Image 262 Global Map Fire Image 263 Global Map Fire Image 264 Global Map Fire Image 265 Global Map Fire Image 266 Global Map Fire Image 267 Global Map Fire Image 268 Global Map Fire Image 269 Global Map Fire Image 270 Global Map Fire Image 271 Global Map Fire Image 272 Global Map Fire Image 273 Global Map Fire Image 274 Global Map Fire Image 275 Global Map Fire Image 276 Global Map Fire Image 277 Global Map Fire Image 278 Global Map Fire Image 279 Global Map Fire Image 280 Global Map Fire Image 281 Global Map Fire Image 282 Global Map Fire Image 283 Global Map Fire Image 284 Global Map Fire Image 285 Global Map Fire Image 286 Global Map Fire Image 287 Global Map Fire Image 288
Fire
Fire Scale

On Earth, something is always burning. Wildfires are started by lightning or accidentally by people, and people use controlled fires to manage farmland and pasture and clear natural vegetation for farmland. Fires can generate large amounts of smoke pollution, release greenhouse gases, and unintentionally degrade ecosystems. But fires can also clear away dead and dying underbrush, which can help restore an ecosystem to good health. In many ecosystems, including boreal forests and grasslands, plants have co-evolved with fire and require periodic burning to reproduce.

The fire maps show the locations of actively burning fires around the world on a monthly basis, based on observations from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA's Terra satellite. The colors are based on a count of the number (not size) of fires observed within a 1,000-square-kilometer area. White pixels show the high end of the count — as many as 30 fires in a 1,000-square-kilometer area per day. Orange pixels show as many as 10 fires, while red areas show as few as 1 fire per day.

Some of the global patterns that appear in the fire maps over time are the result of natural cycles of rainfall, dryness, and lightning. For example, naturally occurring fires are common in the boreal forests of Canada in the summer. In other parts of the world, the patterns are the result of human activity. For example, the intense burning in the heart of South America from August-October is a result of human-triggered fires, both intentional and accidental, in the Amazon Rainforest and the Cerrado (a grassland/savanna ecosystem) to the south. Across Africa, a band of widespread agricultural burning sweeps north to south over the continent as the dry season progresses each year. Agricultural burning occurs in late winter and early spring each year across Southeast Asia.

View, download, or analyze more of these data from NASA Earth Observations (NEO):
Fire