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Big Hamlin Fire, August 2021 Douglas

Out · last detection 16 Sept 2021, 20:35 UTC

The fire started on 2 August 2021 in Douglas, United States, and satellites saw it burning for 46 days. United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC) mapped an official burnt perimeter of 8,836 hectares, spread across a single county.

It is the 81th largest in Oregon since 2016 (of 327 with a page). Number 63 in United States in 2021, of 385.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Miles · 2018Broken Lookout · 2017Smith · 2021Tl Pup 316 · 2017

Burnt area
8,836ha
official perimeter (MTBS / NIFC)
Duration
≈ 46days
2 Aug 2021 – 16 Sept 2021
Counties hit
1
counties
Started on
2 Aug
2021
Heat detections
1,441
in a single hotspot: 101 MW
Danger at start
34
High · FWI index
Average daily power
154MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 2 Aug16 Sept
16 Sept 2021

How it evolved, day by day

2 Aug 2021 · 15 MW · 3 3 Aug 2021 · 18 MW · 9 4 Aug 2021 · 89 MW · 9 5 Aug 2021 · 34 MW · 18 6 Aug 2021 · 222 MW · 28 7 Aug 2021 · 828 MW · 60 8 Aug 2021 · 214 MW · 20 9 Aug 2021 · 642 MW · 102 10 Aug 2021 · 396 MW · 87 11 Aug 2021 · 653 MW · 76 12 Aug 2021 · 435 MW · 84 13 Aug 2021 · 122 MW · 19 14 Aug 2021 · 67 MW · 21 15 Aug 2021 · 60 MW · 17 16 Aug 2021 · 520 MW · 51 17 Aug 2021 · 128 MW · 32 18 Aug 2021 · 77 MW · 16 19 Aug 2021 · 201 MW · 57 20 Aug 2021 · 116 MW · 31 21 Aug 2021 · 4 MW · 2 22 Aug 2021 · 52 MW · 37 23 Aug 2021 · 104 MW · 51 24 Aug 2021 · 109 MW · 32 25 Aug 2021 · 89 MW · 45 26 Aug 2021 · 82 MW · 18 27 Aug 2021 · 50 MW · 17 28 Aug 2021 · 89 MW · 41 29 Aug 2021 · 150 MW · 33 30 Aug 2021 · 49 MW · 26 31 Aug 2021 · 31 MW · 10 1 Sept 2021 · 14 MW · 8 2 Sept 2021 · 30 MW · 28 3 Sept 2021 · 151 MW · 48 4 Sept 2021 · 320 MW · 54 5 Sept 2021 · 203 MW · 70 6 Sept 2021 · 94 MW · 35 7 Sept 2021 · 67 MW · 29 8 Sept 2021 · 207 MW · 56 9 Sept 2021 · 42 MW · 15 11 Sept 2021 · 10 MW · 2 12 Sept 2021 · 76 MW · 8 13 Sept 2021 · 14 MW · 10 14 Sept 2021 · 53 MW · 17 15 Sept 2021 · 7 MW · 6 16 Sept 2021 · 7 MW · 3
2 Aug 7 Aug 9 Aug 16 Aug 23 Aug 30 Aug 6 Sept 14 Sept

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
52km/h · peak gust
15%lowest humidity

It had gone 0 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 42.8 mm on 18 Sept.

This area had burned before

1% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 65 ha in 2018.

How big is it?

10 km
It burned the equivalent of 5.6% of the area of London (88 km² against 1,583 km²).

London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).

This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.

What happened to each county

  1. Douglas where it started
    8,781 ha reached on 2 Aug
    0.7 %

Burnt area inside each county, from crossing the official 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 2020
Built-up area< 0.1 ha
Residents< 20

Inside the perimeter there was no noticeable built-up land and almost nobody lived there (GHSL 2020, 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.

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)
2 Aug 31.5 °C 24 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
3 Aug 30.4 °C 28 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
4 Aug 31.2 °C 24 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
5 Aug 22.7 °C 44 % 48 km/h 0.9 mm Moderate 19
6 Aug 27.7 °C 30 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
7 Aug 28.6 °C 36 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
8 Aug 24.3 °C 27 % 45 km/h 0.5 mm High 30
9 Aug 28.5 °C 24 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
10 Aug 32.0 °C 19 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
11 Aug 35.2 °C 16 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
12 Aug 35.0 °C 21 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
13 Aug 31.3 °C 31 % 41 km/h 0.6 mm High 35
14 Aug 31.4 °C 35 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
15 Aug 32.3 °C 33 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
16 Aug 28.9 °C 27 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
17 Aug 18.9 °C 38 % 48 km/h 0.6 mm High 29
18 Aug 24.3 °C 28 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
19 Aug 24.8 °C 38 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
20 Aug 22.8 °C 36 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
21 Aug 21.1 °C 34 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
22 Aug 23.2 °C 32 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
23 Aug 22.9 °C 22 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
24 Aug 24.6 °C 24 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
25 Aug 23.6 °C 26 % 40 km/h 0.2 mm High 32
26 Aug 25.6 °C 30 % 42 km/h 0.1 mm High 32
27 Aug 24.2 °C 32 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
28 Aug 29.2 °C 19 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
29 Aug 27.6 °C 26 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
30 Aug 22.7 °C 30 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
31 Aug 22.1 °C 24 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
1 Sept 23.5 °C 22 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
2 Sept 24.4 °C 20 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
3 Sept 26.7 °C 18 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
4 Sept 28.8 °C 15 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
5 Sept 28.9 °C 19 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
6 Sept 30.2 °C 24 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
7 Sept 30.7 °C 22 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
8 Sept 29.2 °C 21 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
9 Sept 25.7 °C 35 % 37 km/h 0.6 mm High 32
10 Sept 19.0 °C 69 % 36 km/h 13.0 mm Very low 0
11 Sept 24.7 °C 31 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Low 7
12 Sept 23.1 °C 39 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
13 Sept 22.8 °C 28 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
14 Sept 26.0 °C 23 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
15 Sept 22.3 °C 37 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
16 Sept 23.9 °C 22 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
17 Sept after 26.2 °C 18 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
18 Sept after 15.3 °C 43 % 58 km/h 42.8 mm Very low 0

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 26 Jul 2021
After · 23 Sept 2021

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 · 1,441Every 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 United States ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Big Hamlin Fire last?
The official perimeter only gives the start date (2 August 2021). The end comes from the heat detections inside the perimeter: it burned until 16 September 2021 (46 days from 2 August 2021), the last day with detections before more than 10 days in a row without any, so it is approximate.
How much area did it burn?
The official perimeter published by United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC) is 8,836 hectares (88.4 km²). Other tallies, such as daily incident reports, may give slightly different figures.
Which counties burned?
The fire only entered Douglas (8,781 ha, 0.7 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 35.2 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 52 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 44, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the official burnt perimeter of United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC, public domain), NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of United States. 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: 911 · 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.

RSS Changes to this page

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.

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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 911.

How we know this
  • Perimeter: MTBS (US Geological Survey and US Forest Service), official.
  • The official perimeter has no end date: the end is the last day with VIIRS detections inside the perimeter before a gap of more than 10 days (150 days at most), so it is approximate. 1,441 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 2020, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.

How we build fire pages: methodology ›

Where this data comes from

The perimeter is official and in the public domain. For past years it comes from MTBS (Monitoring Trends in Burn Severity), run by the U.S. Geological Survey and the USDA Forest Service, which map it on Landsat and Sentinel-2 imagery. For the current and last year it comes from WFIGS at the National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC): incident perimeters mapped by fire crews, aircraft and imagery. Heat detections come from the VIIRS sensors aboard Suomi-NPP and NOAA-20, distributed by NASA FIRMS at 375 m resolution. County boundaries come from geoBoundaries ADM2 (Public Domain). The area per county is computed by WorldFires by crossing the perimeter with those boundaries, so it may differ slightly from official figures.