# Thermal anomaly detection
*analysis . methodologies*

Identifies localised high-temperature events against background radiance; good for active fire detection, gas flare monitoring, and volcanic hotspot mapping.

## Specifications
- **family**: Thermal anomaly
- **requirements envelope**: {"kind":"spectral","spectral_range_nm":{"min":3500,"max":12000},"bands_min":1,"calibration_tier_min":"radiometric","snr_min":20,"daylight_required":false,"cloud_tolerant":false}
- **entity type**: methodology
- **last verified date**: 2026-05-22
- **verified by**: sw
- **claim status**: unclaimed
- **subtype**: analysis
- **attributes**: {"family":"Thermal anomaly","summary":"Identifies localised high-temperature events against background radiance; good for active fire detection, gas flare monitoring, and volcanic hotspot mapping.","requirements_envelope":"{\"kind\":\"spectral\",\"spectral_range_nm\":{\"min\":3500,\"max\":12000},\"bands_min\":1,\"calibration_tier_min\":\"radiometric\",\"snr_min\":20,\"daylight_required\":false,\"cloud_tolerant\":false}","kind":"analysis"}

## Editorial
Contextual or fixed threshold applied to mid-wave or longwave IR channels. High saturation risk over intense sources requires careful gain settings. MWIR (~3.5-4 um) is more sensitive to sub-pixel hot targets than LWIR. [Wikipedia: Wildfire](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wildfire)

## Sources
- [wikipedia] | Wikipedia: Wildfire | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wildfire | tier=community | accessed=2026-05-22

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Source: https://eo-atlas.org/methodologies/thermal-anomaly-detection
Maintainer: SpectraWorks B.V. (CC-BY 4.0)