English: Dry conditions, strong wind, and lightning strike continue to ignite fires in the southwestern United States and Mexico through late June 2017. The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on board the Aqua satellite captured a true-color image of the region on June 17.

The image shows primarily the states of Arizona (northwest) and New Mexico (northeast) in the United States and Mexico to the south. Several dozen red hot spots are clustered in each of the states and in Mexico. Each hot spot is an area where the thermal bands detected high temperatures. When accompanied by smoke, as in this image, such hot spots indicate actively burning fire.

As of June 23, Inciweb Incident Information System reported 14 active fires in Arizona, with three prescribed burns. The largest, the Frye Fire, was ignited by lightning strike on June 7 in the old burn scar of the 2004 Nuttall Complex Fire. It has burned 21,335 acres. In New Mexico, the largest fire is the Corral Fire which has consumed 17,029 acres in the Gila National Forest. It was ignited by a lightning strike on June 4, at approximately 7:00 p.m. It is burning in tall grass, timber litter, and understory in juniper and pine stands. Thunderstorms have been bringing precipitation to the region, and the moisture helps dampen fire spread. The erratic winds that accompany such storms, however, can make fire spread more quickly and less predictably.