Live on the globe now: 752 tracked
This is the wildfire layer on the overwatch.earth globe: every glowing dot is an active fire or thermal hotspot detected from orbit, plotted at the exact coordinate where a satellite saw heat. The data comes from NASA FIRMS (Fire Information for Resource Management System), reading the VIIRS instrument aboard the NOAA-20 satellite in near-real-time. Each pass scans the whole planet, so the layer covers wildfires, agricultural burns, gas flares and any other source hot enough to register, anywhere on Earth.
Dot size scales with fire radiative power (FRP), a measure of how much heat a detection is putting out, so larger dots mark more intense burning. Click any hotspot to inspect its detection: FRP, brightness temperature, the satellite's confidence rating, whether it was seen by day or night, and the acquisition time in UTC. We pull the global feed for the last 24 hours and refresh it every few minutes, following the satellites as new overpasses come in.
A hotspot means a satellite measured heat at that spot during an overpass; it is a detection, not a verified, named incident. This is one of roughly 29 live layers you can toggle on the same interactive globe, so wildfires can sit alongside aircraft, earthquakes, lightning and more.
Data source: NASA FIRMS
NASA FIRMS (Fire Information for Resource Management System), specifically the VIIRS sensor aboard the NOAA-20 satellite in near-real-time. We query the global active-fire feed for the last 24 hours.
We poll the FIRMS feed every few minutes, but detections only appear after a satellite passes overhead and the data is processed, typically within a few hours of the overpass. Coverage updates as new orbits come in.
Dot size scales with fire radiative power (FRP), the heat output of the detection. Bigger dots are more intense. Click a dot to see FRP, brightness temperature, confidence, and the day or night flag.
Not necessarily. A dot is a thermal hotspot, meaning a satellite detected heat there. That includes wildfires but also crop burning, gas flares and industrial heat. It is a detection, not a confirmed named fire.