Dramatic satellite photos show California fire’s massive devastation, size, speed

The Park fire, California’s biggest and most destructive of 2024, continues to rage in Northern California, having already burned 414,000 acres across four counties and destroyed hundreds of structures.

The fire has burned for nearly two weeks. Authorities say it began with a man pushing a burning car into a gully.

New photos from space provide a sense of the devastation it has wrought.

The satellite photo below, from Maxar Technologies, shows homes on Richardson Springs Road in Chico. On the left, the neighborhood can be seen July 21, before the fire.

On the right, the same neighborhood is seen five days later. Several homes have been destroyed, and the landscape is charred and smoldering.

Officials warn that hot, dry weather conditions and land that has not burned recently could keep the fire going for months.

As of Tuesday, it was 34% contained. More than 6,500 people had been assigned to fight it, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Prevention.

The image below from NASA gives a sense of the scale of the blaze.

On the left is a view from space of Northern California on July 19, 2024, near the cities of Redding and Chico.

On the right, the same area is seen Aug. 5. Smoke from the fire can be seen billowing on the east side of the enormous charred area.

The Park fire is burning about a dozen miles from Paradise, the site of the deadliest wildfire in California history; 86 people perished in the 2018 Camp fire.

Some families moved away from Paradise after the Camp fire, only to be displaced again by the Park fire, raising questions about the safety of mountain towns in Northern California.

A third satellite view of the raging fire can be seen below.

The video above, from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, shows the path of the fire over time.

In addition to displacing people, the Park fire, now the fourth largest in state history, imperils the fragile Chinook salmon. The federally threatened fish already had been experiencing a population crash.

“This fire entering the upper watershed, where we have sensitive spawning and rearing habitat, is concerning,” said Matt Johnson, a senior environmental scientist with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife.

“We’re all quite anxious about the outcome.”