Wildfires of 2012

Wetmore Fire

2012Custer County, ColoradoWildfire

The Wetmore Fire burned 1,998 acres in Custer County, Colorado, in 2012. It was discovered on October 23, 2012, and contained on November 13, 2012. The cause was recorded as power generation/transmission/distribution.

Size
1,998 acres
Discovered
October 23, 2012
Contained
November 13, 2012
Cause
Human

Map

The burned area boundary MTBS mapped from Landsat imagery, 2,292 acres. Point of origin as reported, 38.207, -105.099.

The record

Reported final size
1,998 acres
Burned area mapped by MTBS
2,292 acres
Area inside the final perimeter
1,998 acres
Discovered
October 23, 2012, 1:10 p.m. local time
Contained
November 13, 2012, 3:00 p.m. local time
Cause
Human, Power generation/transmission/distribution
State
Colorado
County
Custer County
Land ownership at origin
Private
Reporting unit
Royal Gorge Field Office
Agency
Forest Service
Unit
COCUX
Incident type
Wildfire
Unique fire identifier
2012-CORGD-001403
MTBS fire identifier
CO3817710507320121023
MTBS assessment
Extended
Fire occurrence record
W-648469
Perimeter records
2 on file for this fire; the largest is shown
Note on the perimeter
From Glenda. The Fire Situation was extreme, winds were in excess of 75 mph when stuctures were lost and fire behavior was extreme, terrain and wind driven. Operating under a unified command with multiple cooperators and county resources.

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 Colorado in 201212

FireAcresStartCause
High Park Fire87,275Jun 9, 2012Natural
Last Chance Fire45,000Jun 25, 2012
Little Sand Fire24,931May 14, 2012Natural
Heartstrong Fire24,000Mar 18, 2012Human
Waldo Canyon Fire18,947Jun 23, 2012Human
Pine Ridge Fire13,920Jun 27, 2012Natural
Weber Fire10,133Jun 22, 2012Human
Hewlett Fire7,702
Sunrise Mine Fire5,742May 25, 2012Human
Wolf Fire5,126Aug 3, 2012Natural
Lower North Fork Fire4,142Mar 26, 2012Human
Fern Lake Fire3,498Oct 9, 2012

Every fire of 2012 Colorado 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.