Fires in California and Oregon
On Wednesday, August 7, 2002, two large Oregon fires merged into a single massive fire of more than 333,000 acres. In southwest Oregon, the Sour Biscuit fire on the Oregon-California state line, and the larger Florence Fire to its north closed the gap between them and created an enormous blaze that retained the name Biscuit Fire. This image of the active fire fronts (red dots) and thick smoke was captured by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on the Terra satellite on August 11, 2002. In southern California, firefighters continue to battle the 120,000-acre McNalley Fire (red dots) in the Sequoia National Forest in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. The fire was 70 percent contained as of the morning of August 11,2002, the day this image was acquired.