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ECOSTRESS Detects Wildfires in Western U.S.

Aug. 2, 2018
ECOSTRESS, NASA's Earth-observing mission, detected three wildfires burning in the western US on July 28, 2018, the Carr and Whaleback fires in California, and the Perry Fire in Nevada.

click here for Figure 1 for PIA22490click here for Figure 2 for PIA22490
Figure 1Figure 2
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ECOSTRESS, NASA's new Earth-observing mission aboard the International Space Station, detected three wildfires burning in the western US on July 28, 2018 -- the Carr and Whaleback fires in California, and the Perry Fire in Nevada. The fires can be seen in red in Figures 1 and 2. Zooming in on the two larger fires shows the heat data in more detail and also reveals the fires' thick smoke plumes.

ECOSTRESS launched on June 29 as part of a SpaceX commercial resupply mission to the space station. Its primary mission is to measure surface temperatures to detect plant health; however, it can also detect other heat-related phenomenon like heat waves, volcanoes and wildfires. This is the first image of wildfires acquired from ECOSTRESS.

JPL built and manages the ECOSTRESS mission for NASA's Earth Science Division in the Science Mission Directorate in Washington. ECOSTRESS is sponsored by NASA's Earth System Science Pathfinder program, managed by NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia.

For more information on ECOSTRESS visit https://ecostress.jpl.nasa.gov/.

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