3 min readImage of the Day for August 4, 2026Wildland fires in early August 2026 pushed air quality to unhealthy levels, destroyed hundreds of structures, and triggered mandatory evacuations in Spokane.NASA Earth ObservatoryAug 04, 2026 Article
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The start of August 2026 saw ongoing and new wildland fires burning in eastern Washington. West of Chelan, the Little Giant fire continued to produce heavy smoke, while a cluster of smaller fires farther east near Spokane affected tens of thousands of people.
The smoke from these and other fires poured east-northeast across the state and into Idaho, Montana, and several Canadian provinces on the morning of August 2, 2026, when NASA’s Terra satellite captured this image.
At that time, the Little Giant fire had burned more than 38,500 acres (15,600 hectares) and was zero percent contained, according to the fire’s incident management team. After lightning ignited the fire on July 15, gusting winds drove the blaze east to Lake Chelan, with spotting reaching the opposite side of the lake. Smoke from the fire was expected to cause unhealthy to very unhealthy air quality in Chelan to the east and unhealthy conditions in Leavenworth and Wenatchee to the south, according to a smoke outlook issued by the U.S. Interagency Wildland Fire Air Quality Response Program.
