North Complex

2020316,524 acresCalifornia

The North Complex burned 316,524 acres, about 495 square miles, across 2 counties. It began on August 17, 2020.

Watch how it happened

North Complex · 2020

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

Detections19,897satellite fire pixels

Fire milestones

Burn severityHigh, Moderate, Low, Unburned to low, Increased greenness

Burning nowAreas reached in the last half day of satellite passes

New York City, to scale301 square miles of land, drawn at the fire’s scale

Timing: NASA FIRMS satellite fire detections (16,309 VIIRS and 3,588 MODIS) inside the final perimeter; each place takes the time of its nearest detection, so the order is satellite-observed but interpolated between passes, roughly every 12 hours. Severity: Monitoring Trends in Burn Severity (USGS, U.S. Forest Service), mapped from Landsat after the fire.

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 Complex

Burn severity by class
Severity	Share	Acres
Highmost vegetation consumed, soils altered	47%	149,418
Moderatemixed: many trees killed, some survive	25%	78,264
Lowsurface fire, most trees survive	23%	74,279
Unburned to lowislands inside the perimeter, little change	4.6%	14,483

47% of the area inside the perimeter burned at high severity, about 149,418 acres; 72% 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

Plumas County	CA	166,688
Butte County	CA	149,898

Other large fires in California in 2020

August Complex1.07 million acres
Scu Lightning Complex405,644 acres
Creek Fire381,529 acres
Hennessey Fire314,015 acres
Castle Fire174,347 acres
Slater Fire157,657 acres
Red Salmon Complex147,429 acres
Dolan Fire124,343 acres

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