North Fire

201634,569 acresNew Mexico

The North Fire burned 34,569 acres, about 54 square miles, across Socorro County. It began on May 21, 2016.

Watch how it happened

North Fire · 2016

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
Detections1,822satellite 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 North Fire
Burn severity by class
SeverityShareAcres
Highmost vegetation consumed, soils altered2.8%985
Moderatemixed: many trees killed, some survive6.8%2,338
Lowsurface fire, most trees survive50%17,166
Unburned to lowislands inside the perimeter, little change38%12,964
Not mappedcloud, shadow or water in the satellite images3.2%1,117

3% of the area inside the perimeter burned at high severity, about 985 acres; 10% 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.

Acres burned by county
Socorro CountyNM34,562

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