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Armadale fire, October 2016 Armadale, Wandering

Out · last detection 7 Nov 2016, 17:21 UTC

The fire started on 22 October 2016 in Armadale, Australia, and satellites saw it burning for 16 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 10,112 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 1017th largest in Western Australia since 2016 (of 2718 with a page). Number 160 in Australia in 2016, of 427.

Burnt area
10,112ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
16days
22 Oct 2016 – 6 Nov 2016
Municipalities hit
2
local government areas
Started on
22 Oct
2016
Heat detections
735
in a single hotspot: 162 MW
Danger at start
17
Moderate · FWI index
Energy released
4.2GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

7 Nov 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 22 Oct6 Nov

How it evolved, day by day

2223242526272830311234567

Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.

The weather it burned in

35°high
63km/h · peak gust
20%lowest humidity

It had gone 6 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 2.2 mm on 10 Nov.

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

  1. Armadale where it started
    5,279 ha reached on 22 Oct
    9.4 %
  2. Wandering
    4,851 ha reached on 23 Oct
    2.5 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance is from the town centre to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.

The weather day by day

ECMWF ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, the standard reference for past weather, and the Canadian Fire Weather Index (the same system Copernicus uses), computed by WorldFires from that data. Days after the fire run until the first rain.

Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)

Day High Min. humidity Peak gust Rain Danger (FWI)
22 Oct 25.2 °C 20 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
23 Oct 27.5 °C 21 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
24 Oct 19.6 °C 52 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Low 11
25 Oct 17.4 °C 58 % 38 km/h 0.3 mm Low 9
26 Oct 21.5 °C 44 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Low 9
27 Oct 21.8 °C 43 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Low 10
28 Oct 21.3 °C 45 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 12
29 Oct 17.8 °C 55 % 63 km/h 0.7 mm Low 11
30 Oct 19.3 °C 37 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Low 10
31 Oct 21.5 °C 39 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 13
1 Nov 23.9 °C 33 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
2 Nov 29.0 °C 26 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
3 Nov 24.7 °C 31 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
4 Nov 26.9 °C 40 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
5 Nov 35.2 °C 23 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
6 Nov 24.8 °C 48 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 21
7 Nov after 21.5 °C 33 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
8 Nov after 24.2 °C 32 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
9 Nov after 19.1 °C 49 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
10 Nov after 19.1 °C 51 % 52 km/h 2.2 mm Low 6

Before and after, from space

Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.

Before · 15 Oct 2016
After · 13 Nov 2016

If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.

Detections table · 735Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
⬇ Download CSV Times in UTC. Each detection is a 375 m pixel: a large fire yields hundreds per pass.
Date and timeSatelliteFRP (MW)LatLon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Australia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Armadale fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 22 October 2016 and 6 November 2016: 16 days between the first and last heat detection of the perimeter.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 10,112 hectares (101.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Armadale (5,279 ha, 9.4 %); Wandering (4,851 ha, 2.5 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 35.2 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 63 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 25, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Australia (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

Where to verify it

A satellite detection is not an official report. Final figures and the fire’s status are published by each country’s emergency service.

Emergency number: 000

Satellite cross-check

Does something look wrong on this page?

This page is built from satellite data and official records, and it sometimes gets things wrong: the wrong dates, the wrong town, two fires merged into one, or something that was not a wildfire at all. If you know this fire first-hand (you live nearby, saw it, fought it or reported on it), tell us what really happened and we will check it.

Report an error
What do you think is wrong?

We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy. This is not an emergency service: if there is a fire now, call 000.

Where this data comes from

The perimeter comes from the Copernicus Global Wildfire Information System (GWIS), which rebuilds it from MODIS and VIIRS heat detections and publishes it under CC BY 4.0. It is not measured on imagery as in Europe, so it is an estimate. Heat detections come from the VIIRS sensors aboard Suomi-NPP and NOAA-20, distributed by NASA FIRMS at 375 m resolution. Municipal boundaries come from geoBoundaries ADM2 (Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)). The area per municipality is computed by WorldFires by crossing the perimeter with those boundaries, so it may differ from each country’s official figure.