Rocky Fire
200847,985 acresNew Mexico
The Rocky Fire burned 47,985 acres, about 75 square miles, across 3 counties. It began on June 18, 2008.
Watch how it happenedRocky Fire · 2008
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Lowsurface fire, most trees survive | 44% | 20,903 |
| Unburned to lowislands inside the perimeter, little change | 38% | 18,015 |
| Increased greennessvegetation greener after the fire than before | 7.1% | 3,384 |
| Not mappedcloud, shadow or water in the satellite images | 12% | 5,683 |
Most of the area inside the perimeter burned at low severity or not at all.
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.
| Otero County | NM | 37,906 |
| Eddy County | NM | 7,101 |
| Chaves County | NM | 3,010 |
Other large fires in New Mexico in 2008
- Stiles Complex27,839 acres
Monitoring Trends in Burn Severity (USGS and U.S. Forest Service). Type recorded: Wildfire.