The California fire season began on May 1, and already several dangerous wildfires are burning across the state. Pictured in this Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) image from NASA’s Terra satellite on May 4, 2004, is the Cachuma Fire (outlined in red), southeast of the city of Santa Maria (gray patch at upper left of the image) in the San Rafael Mountains. The cause of the fire is currently unknown.
The large-format image is the same spatial resolution as the image above, but shows a wider area of the state, including fires southeast of Los Angeles.
Image courtesy Jacques Descloitres, MODIS Rapid Response Team, NASA-Goddard Space Flight Center
