Fires in Oregon

August 21 12:00:00, 2003

The Booth (south) and Bear Butte (north) Fires in Oregon continued to grow explosively on August 21, 2003. This image shows the huge column of smoke billowing from the two blazes, which were detected by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on the Terra satellite and are marked with yellow in this image. Stretches of highway have been closed as flames leapt over the roadway, and more than a thousand people have already been evacuated.

The high-resolution image provided above is 500 meters per pixel. The MODIS Rapid Response System provides this image at MODIS’ maximum spatial resolution of 250 meters.

Image courtesy Jacques Descloitres, MODIS Rapid Response Team at NASA GSFC