This resource focuses on active fire maps, or live fire maps, across multiple regions. Have a new map to suggest for a new region? Let us know in the comments.
Live Wildfire Maps
Global
FireMap provides real-time data for fire and smoke. You can toggle layers for different regional fire points, satellite hotspots, alert icons, burned areas, volcanic hotspots, and wildfire plume smoke. They use FIRMS data, which is NASA’s satellite data, in addition to points “sourced from agencies in the U.S., Canada, Europe, and Australia.”
Canada & U.S.
This is NASA satellite data known as FIRMS, which is short for Fire Information for Resource Management System. There is also a global version under the hamburger menu in the top-left, linked as Global Fire Map.
Canada, U.S. & Mexico
AirNow provides both fire and smoke data, but is best used as an air quality map. Colored points show data at a particular sensor location. When experiencing air quality ‘unhealthy for sensitive groups’, remember that group also includes wildlife and pets.
Limitations of Wildfire Mapping and Threats to Forecasting
It’s worth noting that imagery of wildfire activity can only be so accurate while the infrastructure to predict and monitor it is under attack. In addition, satellite-based weather reporting can be affected by cloud cover, heavy agricultural activity, and heavy industrial pollutants.
Administrative funding cuts leave communities in the dark on dangerous weather events, which includes wildfire activity. Over 2025 and 2026, this removal of support and infrastructure has proven to be a significant threat. A lack of funding for these essential programs causes loss of jobs, data, and infrastructure that once protected the public. (1, 2)
Clouds, heavy agricultural activity, and industrial pollutants and hot smoke can all hide the signs of fire activity from certain types of satellite imagery. (2) There are alternate data models, technology, and ground weather stations that can help refine a clearer image underneath the clouds to minimize how much of a wildfire might be obscured, as well as report human-generated activity. Unfortunately, removing administrative funding either significantly harms or fully prevents the reliability and availability of this work to aid protections for both people and wildlife. This is just one of the ways that science helps directly protect life on this planet.
Disasters do not stop at political boundaries, nor do they stop at some distant ‘wildlife’. It is now at our doorsteps.
It is not too late, but everyone must act. We must stand up and fight against the attacks on science.
References
References
References:
- Center for American Progress, How Trump’s Cuts to FEMA and NWS Are Leaving Communities Defenseless Against Extreme Weather Disasters, https://www.americanprogress.org/article/how-trumps-cuts-to-fema-and-nws-are-leaving-communities-defenseless-against-extreme-weather-disasters/
- Politico, A ballooning problem: Weather warnings face rising risks from budget cuts, https://www.politico.com/news/2026/07/06/weather-warnings-budget-cuts-00986178
- NASA Earthdata, The Impact of Cloud Cover on Active Fire Detections, https://www.earthdata.nasa.gov/news/blog/impact-cloud-cover-active-fire-detections
0 Comments