Night-time visible data from the Operational Linescan System on board the Defense Meteorological Satellite Program can be used for global fire mapping at medium resolution.

With ~20 years of data record, the Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer offers a unique opportunity for retrospective processing of 1-km data into time series of active fires and burned areas. AVHRR continues to provide useful information on board the current POES series. However, its instrument characteristics are inferior to the recent experimental and semi-operational systems. On the future NPOESS series AVHRR will be replaced by VIIRS.