School Fire
The School Fire burned 52,000 acres in Columbia County, Washington, in 2005. It was discovered on August 5, 2005, and contained on October 1, 2005. The cause was recorded as power generation/transmission/distribution.
- Size
- 52,000 acres
- Discovered
- August 5, 2005
- Contained
- October 1, 2005
- Cause
- Human
Map
The burned area boundary MTBS mapped from Landsat imagery, 51,669 acres. Point of origin as reported, 46.234, -117.681.
The record
- Reported final size
- 52,000 acres
- Burned area mapped by MTBS
- 51,669 acres
- Area inside the final perimeter
- 49,596 acres
- Discovered
- August 5, 2005, 3:20 p.m. local time
- Contained
- October 1, 2005, 8:00 a.m. local time
- Cause
- Human, Power generation/transmission/distribution
- State
- Washington
- County
- Columbia County
- Land ownership at origin
- State or Private
- Reporting unit
- Umatilla National Forest
- Agency
- Forest Service
- Unit
- OR973S
- Incident type
- Wildfire
- Unique fire identifier
- 2005-ORUMF-000019
- MTBS fire identifier
- WA4628511761620050805
- MTBS assessment
- Extended
- Fire occurrence record
- FS-1426809
- Perimeter map method
- Photogrammetric Compilation
- Perimeter records
- 2 on file for this fire; the largest is shown
- Note on the perimeter
- Fire started on WA DNR protection
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 Washington in 200512
| Fire | Acres | Start | Cause |
|---|---|---|---|
| Walker Canyon Fire | 25,000 | Jun 25, 2005 | |
| West Omak Lake Fire | 11,330 | Jul 12, 2005 | Human |
| Mcclane Fire | 6,851 | Aug 9, 2005 | Human |
| Wood Gulch Fire | 5,400 | Jul 23, 2005 | |
| Wall Lake Fire | 5,178 | Jul 27, 2005 | Human |
| Juniper Canyon Fire | 5,000 | Jun 22, 2005 | |
| Weather Station Fire | 4,917 | Jul 5, 2005 | |
| Second Hud Fire | 4,274 | Jul 4, 2005 | Human |
| I 82 Fire | 2,200 | Aug 19, 2005 | Human |
| Badger Road Fire | 2,000 | Jul 25, 2005 | |
| Harker Canyon Fire | 1,566 | Aug 10, 2005 | Human |
| Burnt Bread Fire | 1,246 | Aug 6, 2005 | Human |
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.