Sanford Fire
200286,491 acresUtah
The Sanford Fire burned 86,491 acres, about 135 square miles, across Garfield County. It began on May 31, 2002.
Watch how it happenedSanford Fire · 2002
How it happened
Watch it burn in the order satellites saw it, coloured by how severely each place burned.
How severely it burned
Burn severity inside the final perimeter, classified from Landsat images taken before and after the fire.
| Severity | Share | Acres |
|---|---|---|
| Highmost vegetation consumed, soils altered | 18% | 15,759 |
| Moderatemixed: many trees killed, some survive | 23% | 19,955 |
| Lowsurface fire, most trees survive | 23% | 19,883 |
| Unburned to lowislands inside the perimeter, little change | 36% | 30,869 |
18% of the area inside the perimeter burned at high severity, about 15,759 acres; 41% burned at moderate or high severity.
Monitoring Trends in Burn Severity (U.S. Geological Survey and USDA Forest Service). Classes come from the change in a Landsat burn index (dNBR) between images before and after the fire; acres are each class’s share of the fire’s mapped area.
Where it burned
Acres inside each county, measured from the satellite-mapped perimeter.
| Garfield County | UT | 81,853 |
Other large fires in Utah in 2002
- Rattle Complex (Rattle)87,360 acres
Monitoring Trends in Burn Severity (USGS and U.S. Forest Service). Type recorded: Wildfire.