You can identify burned areas on this image from the dark, mottled tones. Plumes of smoke can also be seen. Lakes, on the other hand are dark black and of a uniformly smooth texture. Great Slave Lake is at the bottom right and Great Bear Lake at the top centre. The largest northern-flowing river in North America, the Mackenzie, cuts diagonally through the image.
Unburned vegetation is shown here in green, orange and red tones.
Compare the fire progression of one affected area, over one month's time. The Mackenzie River acted as a natural fire-break for one large fire on the left side of the image. Alternative methods would be impractical and too expensive. Such small scale imagery is ideal for frequently repeated views of the same area, since the NOAA satellite passes overhead once per day in the daytime. Three spectral channels of data were used from the NOAA satellite to create this composite image.