On 28 August there was some discussion on whether there was a pyroCb in Montana. Upon further investigation it was found that there was a pyroCb at 48.2 N 113 W. GOES-15 detected the smoke plume and pyroCb cloud, as well as the fire hot spot. Starting at 21:00 UTC on 28 August, the animation below shows visible (.63 μm) on the left and shortwave IR (3.9 μm) on the right (click image to play animation). In the shortwave IR images the red pixels indicate very hot IR brightness temperatures exhibited by the fire source region.
GOES-15 0.63 µm visible channel (left) and 3.9 µm shortwave IR channel images (right) (click to play animation)
In addition, using GOES-15 10.7 μm IR channel the cloud-top IR brightness temperature could be found. The animation below, starting at 21:00 UTC on 28 August, shows the brightness temperature for the pyroCb is -67ºC around 23:00 UTC on 28 August (red color enhancement).
GOES-15 10.7 µm IR channel images (click to play animation)