Barkly fire, 26 August 2024 Barkly
The fire started on 26 August 2024 in Barkly, Australia, and satellites saw it burning for 10 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 14,403 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 952th largest in Northern Territory since 2016 (of 3496 with a page). Number 155 in Australia in 2024, of 638.
- Burnt area
- 14,403ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 10days
- 26 Aug 2024 – 4 Sept 2024
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- local government areas
- Started on
- 26 Aug
- 2024
- Heat detections
- 512
- in a single hotspot: 71 MW
- Danger at start
- 64
- Extreme · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 544MW
- 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 29 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
40% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,108 ha in 2016, 3,557 ha in 2017, 85 ha in 2018, 221 ha in 2023.
What happened to each town
-
Barkly where it started14,435 ha reached on 26 Aug0.0 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 26 Aug | 35.7 °C | 18 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 64 |
| 27 Aug | 34.4 °C | 14 % | 47 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 64 |
| 28 Aug | 34.7 °C | 15 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 62 |
| 29 Aug | 34.3 °C | 20 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 58 |
| 30 Aug | 35.7 °C | 14 % | 21 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 31 Aug | 36.1 °C | 16 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 50 |
| 1 Sept | 35.5 °C | 20 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 53 |
| 2 Sept | 37.0 °C | 17 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 63 |
| 3 Sept | 35.3 °C | 12 % | 62 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 84 |
| 4 Sept | 33.9 °C | 12 % | 50 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 70 |
| 5 Sept after | 33.5 °C | 25 % | 50 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 64 |
| 6 Sept after | 34.2 °C | 25 % | 43 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 61 |
| 7 Sept after | 35.3 °C | 23 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 55 |
| 8 Sept after | 34.1 °C | 24 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 9 Sept after | 32.1 °C | 22 % | 58 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 75 |
| 10 Sept after | 33.6 °C | 18 % | 52 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 68 |
| 11 Sept after | 34.6 °C | 18 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 58 |
| 12 Sept after | 33.7 °C | 16 % | 59 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 75 |
| 13 Sept after | 29.7 °C | 11 % | 64 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 83 |
| 14 Sept after | 30.8 °C | 12 % | 54 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 74 |
| 15 Sept after | 32.6 °C | 15 % | 51 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 67 |
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 29 August 2024 the air beside the fire reached 32 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 20: 1.4 times the WHO daily 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 · 512Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Barkly fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 26 August 2024 and 4 September 2024: 10 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 14,403 hectares (144.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Barkly (14,435 ha, 0.0 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 37.0 °C, humidity dropped to 12 % and gusts hit 62 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 84, class Very extreme.
- 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
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.