This is how I rack up overtime

Things are cookin' right now. This morning, I downloaded a Landsat 5 TM scene for the Saucer Rx Burn last year in Minnesota. I'm performing an extended assessment for this fire because it burned late enough in the year last year that snow fell before we could get a good postfire image. This fire burned in the Boundary Waters Wilderness Canoe Area as the resource managers there continue to remove fuels in the area. On July 4, 1999, the area experienced a severe "blow down", or tornadic-strength winds in a straight direction that knocked over hundreds of thousands of acres of trees. The folks there have done mechanical fuel treamtents, but have also done a number of prescribed burns to help manage the fuel situation. I've probably mapped 6 or 7 of these fires.

CNN and most major news agencies are reporting about the fire near Sedona, AZ (Brins), the ones in New Mexico (Skates and Reserve Complex), and one in S. Colorado. I downloaded imagery of the Skates and Reserve Complex Fires today and was able to deliver a preliminary product for the Reserve Complex. When I left work today (at 6:30pm), Skates was still downloading. I'll do it early tomorrow.

The images for these fires I downloaded were both acquired last weekend, but the incident folks couldn't wait until the next image acquisition was scheduled (June 26 and July 3). So we got the imagery from last weekend that had some active fire locations and some smoke, althouth the smoke coverage was minimal.

I think the BAER (Burned Area Emergency Response) folks are more excited about the Bear Fire that went from 7,000 acres to 24,300 acres in one day. I scheduled an ASTER acquisition for that guy that will be acquired this Sunday (in that link, check out June 23 and June 25--they made a mistake saying the Bear Fire was in Arizona...it's actually in far western New Mexico).

Two fires today; two more tomorrow; one Friday night; two on Saturday; one on Sunday. Looks like a busy week, weekend, and beginning of next week.