About NearbyFires

NearbyFires.com is a public data site that makes wildfire information accessible and understandable. We combine real-time NASA satellite fire detection data with historical named fire records from the National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC) to give you a complete picture of wildfire activity across the United States.

The site serves two main audiences:

• People checking on active fires — the home page map shows all NASA satellite-detected fire anomalies from the past 24 hours, updated every 30 minutes. Each dot represents a 375m–1km area where a satellite detected unusual heat consistent with active fire.
• Researchers, historians, and curious people — the named fire pages, state history pages, and annual season recaps provide context on historical wildfire patterns, the biggest and most destructive fires, and how fire seasons compare over time.

What This Site Is Not

NearbyFires is not an emergency notification service. For official fire evacuation orders, road closures, and emergency alerts, always check your county's Office of Emergency Services, CAL FIRE (California), or your state's equivalent agency.

Data Freshness

Fire detection data is cached from the NASA FIRMS API with a 30-minute refresh interval. There is inherent latency: satellite overpasses occur roughly every 12 hours per satellite, so a fire that started in the last few hours may not yet appear on the map. VIIRS (NOAA-20/Suomi NPP) has higher frequency near the poles.