Wildfires of 1996

Cuyama Fire

1996CaliforniaWildfire

The Cuyama Fire burned 1,590 acres in California, in 1996. It was discovered on July 3, 1996, and contained on July 5, 1996. The cause was recorded as debris and open burning.

Size
1,590 acres
Discovered
July 3, 1996
Contained
July 5, 1996
Cause
Human

Map

The burned area boundary MTBS mapped from Landsat imagery, 1,665 acres. Point of origin as reported, 34.883, -119.668.

The record

Reported final size
1,590 acres
Burned area mapped by MTBS
1,665 acres
Area inside the final perimeter
1,400 acres
Discovered
July 3, 1996, 2:32 p.m. local time
Contained
July 5, 1996, 8:00 a.m. local time
Cause
Human, Debris and open burning
State
California
Land ownership at origin
State
Reporting unit
Central California District
Agency
Forest Service
Unit
CABBD
Incident type
Wildfire
MTBS fire identifier
CA3492011967219960703
MTBS assessment
Initial
Fire occurrence record
W-14205

The three sizes are three measurements: the size the agency reported when the fire was out, the burned area MTBS drew from satellite imagery before and after, and the GIS area inside the final perimeter, unburned islands included. They rarely agree exactly.

Other large fires in California in 199612

FireAcresStartCause
Fifty-Eight Fire106,668Aug 15, 1996Human
Fork Fire83,323Aug 11, 1996Human
Wild Fire25,620Oct 7, 1996Human
Ambrose Complex (Damon-Long) Fire23,398Aug 26, 1996Natural
Rogge Fire22,080Aug 13, 1996Natural
Marple Fire22,000Aug 26, 1996Human
Skyline Fire19,839Apr 27, 1996Human
Unnamed Fire19,244May 28, 1996
Panoche II Fire18,340Apr 27, 1996Human
Mercy Fire16,820Jun 18, 1996Human
Otay 322 Fire14,720Oct 22, 1996Human
Calabasas Fire13,190Oct 21, 1996Human

Every fire of 1996 California fire history

Nearby

Sources

Perimeters from the National Interagency Fire Center’s Interagency Fire Perimeter History, compiled from the Forest Service, BLM, BIA, Fish and Wildlife Service, National Park Service, the Alaska Interagency Fire Center and CAL FIRE. Burned areas and ignition dates from Monitoring Trends in Burn Severity (MTBS), a program of the US Geological Survey and the USDA Forest Service. Fire reports from Short, Karen C. 2022, Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014], 6th Edition, Forest Service Research Data Archive, doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6. Records before 2014 were joined by this site: a fire report to the burned area its MTBS identifier names, a perimeter to the burned area it lies in when the names or the sizes agree.