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[NASA] Cottonwood Fire Chars Utah

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Earth Observatory
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  3. Cottonwood Fire Chars Utah
 


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June 5
June 29

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Mountainous landscapes appear green and untouched by fire in a satellite image acquired on June 5, 2026.
NASA Earth Observatory/Michala Garrison

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An image of the same area shows a large brown patch spanning much of the image in an image acquired after the fire on June 29, 2026.
NASA Earth Observatory/Michala Garrison
June 5June 29

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Mountainous landscapes appear green and untouched by fire in a satellite image acquired on June 5, 2026.
NASA Earth Observatory/Michala Garrison
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An image of the same area shows a large brown patch spanning much of the image in an image acquired after the fire on June 29, 2026.
NASA Earth Observatory/Michala Garrison

June 5

June 29


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Image Details

A burned landscape spans more than 150 square miles (390 square kilometers) of rugged terrain northwest of Junction, Utah, as seen in this pair of images captured by the
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(Operational Land Imager) on
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and
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on June 5, 2026 (left) and June 29, 2026 (right). NASA Earth Observatory images by Michala Garrison.

After a winter of

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and an unusually warm and dry start to summer, the National Interagency Fire Center
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that the Great Basin and parts of the Rockies faced an elevated risk of wildfires in July 2026.

The warning proved accurate. By July 7, firefighters labored to contain nearly three dozen large, early-season wildland fires that raced through forests in several parts of the western U.S.

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was among the most active states, with fires having charred 558 square miles (1,445 square kilometers) and
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that were not fully contained still burning.

The

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ranked as one of Utah’s—and the country’s—largest and most destructive fires of the year so far. As of July 7, it had burned 150 square miles (390 square kilometers), just shy of the
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in eastern Utah.
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captured the
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image (bands
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) above (right) on June 29, 2026, when blackened vegetation spanned a large patch of rugged terrain along the Beaver River. The image on the left shows the same area on June 5, a few weeks before the fire ignited. In this band combination of shortwave infrared, near infrared, and visible light, unburned vegetation appears bright green, snow is blue, and clouds are white.

Ponderosa pine, oak, sagebrush, and grasses were among the vegetation types that burned. Officials with the state’s forestry division told news media that the Cottonwood fire had destroyed up to

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. Eagle Point Ski Resort, which lost more than
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, also
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to four of its five chairlifts.

The damage to forests was extensive, though isolated patches survived largely unscathed, remaining as green oases within the broader burned area. Among them were the forests around Tushar Campground, the site of a 4-H summer camp. Beaver County officials

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years of forest treatments, such as clearing brush and trimming branches, with helping save the campground and surrounding forests.

The fire spreads especially rapidly on June 23 and June 26. The fire perimeters in this visualization are based on data from NASA’s Fire Events Data Suite.
NASA Earth Observatory/Michala Garrison

As the fire spread, NASA’s

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(FEDS) tracked its progression and rate of growth. The visualization above, based on the FEDS system, shows the fire
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on June 23 and tripling in size over 12 hours that day as it spread to the north, east, and south. It also grew rapidly on June 26, when it made a run to the north. FEDS draws on data from the
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(Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite) sensors aboard the Suomi NPP, NOAA-20, and NOAA-21 satellites, which detect active fires day and night by their
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.

FEDS is one of several tools available to firefighters and emergency management officials when responding to fires. First responders often rely on higher-resolution airborne imagers or on firefighters walking fire edges to map perimeters. FEDS offers a different advantage: consistent, easily accessible data that do not need to be specially requested, according to Tempest McCabe, a University of Maryland scientist based at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center who helped develop the tool. As a result, FEDS often detects a fire’s start earlier than other sources and tracks blazes for their full duration. To capitalize on strengths like these, the FEDS team is working closely with operational

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, with support from NASA’s
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, to better understand and anticipate periods of rapid fire spread.

A total of 1,289 firefighters have been deployed to the Cottonwood fire, according to

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, a website managed by the
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. As of July 7, the fire was 56 percent contained, but forecasters expect a hot, dry weather pattern to persist in the coming days, with fire behavior likely to be “very active to extreme” over the next 72 hours.

Government satellite data are part of a global system of observations used to track fire behavior and analyze emerging trends. Among the real-time wildfire monitoring tools that NASA makes available are

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(Fire Information for Resource Management System), the
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browser, and the
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.

As of July 7, 2026, fires had burned 5,265 square miles (13,636 square kilometers) across the United States, according to the

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. That’s 46 percent more than the 10-year average (2016-2025) for that point in the season.

NASA Earth Observatory images by Michala Garrison, using Landsat data from the 

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and fire perimeter data from the
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. Story by Adam Voiland.

Downloads

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June 5, 2026

JPEG (1.39 MB)

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June 29, 2026

JPEG (1.41 MB)

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FEDS fire perimeter (June 23-July 7)

JPEG (1.80 MB)

References & Resources

  • 2KUTV (2026, July 6)
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    . Accessed July 7, 2026.
  • KSL.com (2026, July 2)
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    . Accessed July 7, 2026.
  • KUER (2026, July 6)
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    . Accessed July 7, 2026.
  • NASA Earthdata (2026)
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    . Accessed July 7, 2026.
  • National Interagency Fire Center (2026, July 6)
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    . Accessed July 7, 2026.
  • National Interagency Fire Center (2026, July 6)
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    . Accessed July 7, 2026.
  • National Interagency Fire Center (2026, July 1)
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    . Accessed July 7, 2026.
  • The Salt Lake Tribune (2026, June 30)
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    . Accessed July 7, 2026.
  • The Salt Lake Tribune (2026, June 30)
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    . Accessed July 7, 2026.
  • U.S. Drought Monitor (2026, June 30)
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    . Accessed July 7, 2026.
  • Utah Fire Info Home (2026, July 7)
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    . Accessed July 7, 2026.

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