Port Hills: Before and after the fires

These satellite pictures show the devastation caused by last week’s blaze, with vegetation in red

New satellite imagery reveals the extent of the damage caused by the fires that raged across 2000ha of Christchurch’s Port Hills last week.

The fire began as two blazes in the afternoon of February 13: the first one in Lansdowne on Early Valley Rd, and a second one that started in a carpark near Marleys Hill, off Summit Rd.

Two days later, they had combined into one large inferno, a state of emergency was declared and about 450 houses were evacuated.

Images released by Spanish company Deimos Imaging were captured by its satellite Deimos-2: before the fire on September 9, 2015, and after on February 20, 2017.

Vegetation is red in the images and the different shades provide crucial information on chlorophyll content and plant health.

The dark area in the image from February 20 reveals the extent of the devastation.