Wildfires of 1997

Grey Ditch Fire

1997LouisianaWildfire

The Grey Ditch Fire burned 2,000 acres in Louisiana, in 1997. It was discovered on September 30, 1997. The cause was recorded as debris and open burning.

Size
2,000 acres
Discovered
September 30, 1997
Cause
Human

Map

The burned area boundary MTBS mapped from Landsat imagery, 2,449 acres. Point of origin as reported, 29.867, -93.776.

The record

Reported final size
2,000 acres
Burned area mapped by MTBS
2,449 acres
Discovered
September 30, 1997, 10:00 a.m. local time
Cause
Human, Debris and open burning
State
Louisiana
Land ownership at origin
Fish and Wildlife Service
Reporting unit
Sabine National Wildlife Refuge
Agency
Fish and Wildlife Service
Incident type
Wildfire
MTBS fire identifier
LA2991009376219970930
MTBS assessment
Initial (SS)
Fire occurrence record
FWS-1997LASBR4254
Note on the perimeter
This is in an area often burned and evidence of recent burns throughout area.

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 Louisiana in 19977

FireAcresStartCause
Unit 2 RX Fire5,835Sep 3, 1997
Kisatchie Hills Fire3,134Sep 14, 1997Human
Unnamed Fire3,010Nov 2, 1997
Unnamed Fire1,765Sep 15, 1997
Unnamed Fire1,586Sep 30, 1997
Bayou Fire1,200Jul 24, 1997Natural
Unnamed Fire1,097Aug 30, 1997

Every fire of 1997 Louisiana fire history

Nearby

Sources

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.