Fire in Wilsons Promontory National Park

Fire in Wilsons Promontory National Park

A fire that started on April 1, 2005, in the Wilsons Promontory National Park on the southeastern tip of Victoria, Australia, had scorched around 17,000 acres by April 12, 2005. These images from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra and Aqua satellites show the region before, during, and after the huge blaze.

The top image shows the fire in progress on April 2, 2005. Vegetation is bright green, water is dark blue to black, and the location of the active fire is outlined in red. Within the fire perimeter detected by MODIS, active flames glow bright pink in this infrared-enhanced image. The two images below show the park before the fire started (left) and after it was winding down. The burned area appears deep red and, in one place, appears to stretch from one coast of the tiny peninsula to the other.

The high-resolution image is from April 9. The MODIS Rapid Response Team provides the images (March 31, April 2, April 9) at additional resolutions.

NASA image courtesy the MODIS Rapid Response Team, Goddard Space Flight Center