Aurukun fire, 22 August 2023 Aurukun, Cook, Napranum
The fire started on 22 August 2023 in Aurukun, Australia, and satellites saw it burning for 23 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 11,298 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.
It is the 653th largest in Queensland since 2016 (of 1742 with a page). Number 490 in Australia in 2023, of 1237.
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- Burnt area
- 11,298ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 23days
- 22 Aug 2023 – 13 Sept 2023
- Municipalities hit
- 3
- local government areas
- Started on
- 22 Aug
- 2023
- Heat detections
- 481
- in a single hotspot: 72 MW
- Danger at start
- 39
- Very high · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 229MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
98% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 5,999 ha in 2016, 5,021 ha in 2017, 6,293 ha in 2018, 4,075 ha in 2019, 5,995 ha in 2020, 2,981 ha in 2021, 5,719 ha in 2022. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 11,089 ha that had burned before.
- 3,162 ha Aurukun fire, August 2017 5,412 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,701 ha Aurukun fire, August 2020 6,533 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,532 ha Aurukun fire, August 2016 6,016 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,973 ha Aurukun fire, August 2022 7,873 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,654 ha Cook fire, August 2018 25,955 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,640 ha Cook fire, August 2019 15,061 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 303 ha Aurukun fire, October 2016 6,992 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 215 ha Cook fire, October 2016 27,363 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
Berlin boundary: geoBoundaries · Federal Agency for Cartography and Geodesy (dl-de/by-2-0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
Aurukun where it started9,277 ha reached on 22 Aug1.2 %
-
1,881 ha reached on 1 Sept0.0 %
-
183 ha reached on 1 Sept0.1 %
Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.
People and buildings inside the perimeter
GHSL 2025Inside the perimeter there was no noticeable built-up land and almost nobody lived there (GHSL 2025, satellite-based estimate).
This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned. The GHSL 2025 epoch is a projection made from 2020 and earlier data.
Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu
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 Aug | 32.4 °C | 32 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 23 Aug | 32.0 °C | 37 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 24 Aug | 32.7 °C | 44 % | 47 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 25 Aug | 32.4 °C | 35 % | 47 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 26 Aug | 30.5 °C | 39 % | 54 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 27 Aug | 29.8 °C | 44 % | 55 km/h | 0.1 mm | Very high 40 |
| 28 Aug | 32.2 °C | 30 % | 54 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 29 Aug | 32.9 °C | 29 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 38 |
| 30 Aug | 33.0 °C | 27 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 31 Aug | 33.3 °C | 24 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 1 Sept | 33.4 °C | 27 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 2 Sept | 33.4 °C | 23 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 3 Sept | 33.5 °C | 25 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 4 Sept | 33.4 °C | 28 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 5 Sept | 33.8 °C | 28 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 6 Sept | 34.2 °C | 35 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 7 Sept | 32.9 °C | 52 % | 48 km/h | 0.9 mm | High 28 |
| 8 Sept | 33.4 °C | 47 % | 44 km/h | 0.3 mm | High 32 |
| 9 Sept | 34.1 °C | 41 % | 57 km/h | 0.1 mm | Very high 40 |
| 10 Sept | 33.3 °C | 38 % | 59 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 11 Sept | 33.4 °C | 31 % | 52 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 12 Sept | 32.2 °C | 34 % | 50 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 13 Sept | 32.7 °C | 34 % | 52 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 14 Sept after | 32.3 °C | 33 % | 52 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 15 Sept after | 32.0 °C | 29 % | 50 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 16 Sept after | 33.3 °C | 27 % | 55 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 50 |
| 17 Sept after | 29.7 °C | 43 % | 49 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 18 Sept after | 32.4 °C | 35 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 19 Sept after | 34.6 °C | 33 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 20 Sept after | 34.2 °C | 37 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 21 Sept after | 35.4 °C | 33 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 22 Sept after | 36.6 °C | 23 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 23 Sept after | 33.8 °C | 28 % | 49 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 51 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.
The smoke
CAMS · CopernicusOn 31 August 2023 the air beside the fire reached 20 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).
Particles from the Copernicus CAMS model at the centre of the perimeter; these are not measurements in each town. The pale bar is the worst hour, the solid one the daily average.
Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS)
Detections table · 481Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 49,808 haCook17 July 2026 · 31 days · 7 km away
- 18,717 haAurukunSeptember 2021 · 19 days · 12 km away
- 27,363 haCook11 October 2016 · 34 days · 16 km away
- 25,955 haCook24 August 2018 · 37 days · 27 km away
- 28,131 haAurukun4 August 2023 · 48 days · 37 km away
- 23,763 haAurukun31 October 2016 · 7 days · 38 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Aurukun fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 22 August 2023 to 13 September 2023 (23 days). The perimeter dates it from 26 August 2023 to 6 September 2023.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 11,298 hectares (113.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 3 municipalities: Aurukun (9,277 ha, 1.2 %); Cook (1,881 ha, 0.0 %); Napranum (183 ha, 0.1 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 34.2 °C, humidity dropped to 23 % and gusts hit 59 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 46, class Very 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 · Emergency number and official warnings ›
Satellite cross-check
History of this page Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
No changes since 24 October 2026.
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
How we know this
- Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery; 2 polygons grouped in this page.
- Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 26 August 2023 to 6 September 2023. 481 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
- We have not matched this page with any official record.
- Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
- Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2025, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.
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.