Monitoring Trends in Burn Severity (MTBS) is a multi-year initiative that consistently maps the burn severity and burned area extent of fires at 30 meter resolution across all lands of the United States for the period spanning 1984 to present.   All fires greater than 1000 acres in the west and 500 acres in the east are mapped.  The data generated by MTBS is used to identify national trends in burn severity for vegetation types, fuel models, condition classes, and land management activities such as accessing alternatives for fire management plans, fire effects on threatened and endangered species, wildland fire incident management, burned area rehabilitation, and research in post-fire succession and regeneration relative to burn severity levels.  MTBS is conducted through a partnership between the U.S. Geological Survey National Center for Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) and the USDA Forest Service Remote Sensing Applications Center (RSAC).  MTBS data are used to update LANDFIRE data products such as existing vegetation type, succession class, and fire behavior model layers.  These updated LANDFIRE data are then used in the Wildland Fire Decision Support System (WFDSS) to provide managers with consistent information of potential risk from new fire ignitions.  For more information please visit the MTBS web page.

MTBS Point of Contact:
Henry Bastian, LANDFIRE Lead/Fire Ecologist