Tom Fire

201164,840 acresTexas

The Tom Fire burned 64,840 acres, about 101 square miles, across 2 counties. It began on February 27, 2011.

Watch how it happened

Tom Fire · 2011

How it happened

Watch it burn in the order satellites saw it, coloured by how severely each place burned.

About this replay
Date (UTC)—Historical replay
Burned so far—acres
High severity—of the area so far
Detections22satellite fire pixels

How severely it burned

Burn severity inside the final perimeter, classified from Landsat images taken before and after the fire.

Map of burn severity across the Tom Fire
Burn severity by class
SeverityShareAcres
Lowsurface fire, most trees survive96%62,263
Unburned to lowislands inside the perimeter, little change4.0%2,577

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.

Acres burned by county
Andrews CountyTX49,701
Martin CountyTX15,084

Other large fires in Texas in 2011

Monitoring Trends in Burn Severity (USGS and U.S. Forest Service). Type recorded: Wildfire.