Wildfires of 1998

Bob Gap Fire

1998Letcher County, VirginiaWildfire

The Bob Gap Fire burned 1,085 acres in Letcher County, Virginia, in 1998. It was discovered on November 29, 1998, and contained on December 4, 1998. The cause was recorded as arson/incendiarism.

Size
1,085 acres
Discovered
November 29, 1998
Contained
December 4, 1998
Cause
Human

Map

The final perimeter from the Interagency Fire Perimeter History, 1,106 acres, mapped by digitized from hardcopy pbs/seq. Point of origin as reported, 37.233, -82.517.

The record

Reported final size
1,085 acres
Area inside the final perimeter
1,106 acres
Discovered
November 29, 1998, 6:00 p.m. local time
Contained
December 4, 1998, 10:00 p.m. local time
Cause
Human, Arson/incendiarism
State
Virginia
County
Letcher County
Reporting unit
George Washington & Jefferson National Forests
Agency
Forest Service
Unit
VAVAF
Incident type
Wildfire
Fire occurrence record
FS-339627
Perimeter map method
Digitized From Hardcopy PBS/SEQ
Note on the perimeter
Fire Intensity Level 1, burned 1062 acres Kentucky, 23 in NF

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 Virginia in 19983

FireAcresStartCause
Stoney Lick Fire1,800Nov 21, 1998Human
Calvary Fire1,431Oct 25, 1998Human
Se Blocks Fire1,277Apr 29, 1998

Every fire of 1998 Virginia 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. 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.