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Bulkley-Nechako C fire, 30 July 2018 Bulkley-Nechako C

Out · last detection 27 Aug 2018, 11:13 UTC

The fire started on 30 July 2018 in Bulkley-Nechako C, Canada, and satellites saw it burning for 29 days. Canada’s CWFIS (Natural Resources Canada) mapped an official burnt perimeter of 2,251 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single census subdivision.

It is the 227th largest in British Columbia since 2016 (of 343 with a page). Number 137 in Canada in 2018, of 212.

Burnt area
2,251ha
official perimeter (CWFIS)
Duration
29days
30 Jul 2018 – 27 Aug 2018
Census subdivisions hit
1
municipalities
Started on
30 Jul
2018
Heat detections
617
in a single hotspot: 184 MW
Danger at start
7
Low · FWI index
Average daily power
842MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 30 Jul27 Aug
27 Aug 2018

How it evolved, day by day

15 Aug 2018 · 25 MW · 2 16 Aug 2018 · 178 MW · 8 17 Aug 2018 · 4,981 MW · 193 18 Aug 2018 · 195 MW · 48 19 Aug 2018 · 381 MW · 48 20 Aug 2018 · 1,463 MW · 62 21 Aug 2018 · 455 MW · 73 22 Aug 2018 · 2,352 MW · 147 23 Aug 2018 · 38 MW · 21 24 Aug 2018 · 23 MW · 12 26 Aug 2018 · 15 MW · 2 27 Aug 2018 · 1 MW · 1
17 Aug 21 Aug 24 Aug

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

The weather it burned in

24°high
62km/h · peak gust
22%lowest humidity

It had gone 0 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.4 mm on 29 Aug.

This area had burned before

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

How big is it?

10 km
It burned the equivalent of 1.4% of the area of London (23 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 census subdivision

  1. Bulkley-Nechako C where it started
    2,289 ha reached on 15 Aug
    0.1 %

Burnt area inside each census subdivision, 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)
30 Jul 24.0 °C 44 % 27 km/h 3.8 mm Low 7
31 Jul 23.0 °C 47 % 20 km/h 1.8 mm Very low 1
1 Aug 22.2 °C 43 % 26 km/h 0.6 mm Very low 2
2 Aug 19.1 °C 51 % 46 km/h 2.5 mm Very low 2
3 Aug 17.3 °C 45 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Low 7
4 Aug 18.7 °C 45 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Low 8
5 Aug 21.6 °C 35 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 13
6 Aug 18.9 °C 32 % 60 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
7 Aug 21.0 °C 33 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
8 Aug 21.5 °C 36 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 21
9 Aug 18.9 °C 45 % 60 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 21
10 Aug 16.9 °C 30 % 47 km/h 0.1 mm Moderate 20
11 Aug 17.5 °C 32 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
12 Aug 19.6 °C 29 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
13 Aug 21.3 °C 39 % 55 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
14 Aug 17.6 °C 39 % 62 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
15 Aug 17.8 °C 27 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
16 Aug 18.5 °C 22 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
17 Aug 16.9 °C 31 % 58 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
18 Aug 16.8 °C 30 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
19 Aug 18.4 °C 24 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 21
20 Aug 20.3 °C 27 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
21 Aug 23.3 °C 24 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
22 Aug 18.3 °C 38 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
23 Aug 13.7 °C 54 % 36 km/h 2.0 mm Moderate 19
24 Aug 14.5 °C 40 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Low 7
25 Aug 13.1 °C 51 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 11
26 Aug 13.4 °C 45 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 15
27 Aug 14.8 °C 46 % 43 km/h 0.3 mm Moderate 19
28 Aug after 13.0 °C 62 % 55 km/h 0.9 mm Moderate 15
29 Aug after 11.2 °C 61 % 42 km/h 1.4 mm Low 8

Its twins: fires that started in the same weather

It started with an FWI of 7.1, a minimum humidity of 44% and rain the day before. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2016: 22.

FWI at the start 7.1
Minimum humidity 44 %
Days without rain 0
this fire chosen twins rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar

Outlines of the closest twins

Bulkley-Nechako C fire, June 2021
13,990 ha 71 days FWI 7.2 Min. humidity 44 % 32 km away, in 2021

First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 9.2 mm on 15 Aug.

What happened to them

70 days
median duration
4,785 ha
median area
36 %
went past 10,000 ha
3.6 mm
rain at the end (median; 22 of 22 had it)

It stayed below its twins: 2,251 ha against a median of 4,785 ha. It lasted 29 days, against 70 days.

All of them had rain in the ten days after the end: the first rainy day brought a median of 3.6 mm.

This is a bank of analogues: it shows what usually happens, not what will happen. With fewer than 15 twins we give no figures. How we calculate it

How it ended

1.4 mmfirst rain
29 Aug2 days after it ended
62km/h · max. gust

It was considered over on 27 Aug, and on 29 Aug 1.4 mm fell. We do not know whether the rain or the firefighters put it out. Twins with rain when they ended: 22 of 22, with a median of 3.6 mm.

Weather on this page: Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)

How a twin is chosen

  • Same area: fires that have already ended, less than 250 km from this one, since 2016.
  • Same start: we compare the FWI on the first day, the minimum humidity that day and the run of days without rain before it. The slider sets how much they may differ.
  • Only pages with final weather data (ERA5 reanalysis) calculated in the same way as this fire’s; agricultural and grass burns and pages with data under review are left out.
  • Fires burning at the same time as this one (a week before or after) are left out: they share the same spell of weather and do not count as a precedent.
  • They are sorted by similarity, and the outlines of the first five are drawn.

How we calculate it

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 23 Jul 2018
After · 3 Sept 2018

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 · 617Every 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 Canada

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Bulkley-Nechako C fire last?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 30 July 2018 to 27 August 2018 (29 days). The perimeter dates it from 30 July 2018 to 22 August 2018.
How much area did it burn?
The official perimeter mapped by Canada’s CWFIS (Natural Resources Canada) is 2,251 hectares (22.5 km²). Other tallies, such as those of provincial agencies, may give slightly different figures.
Which census subdivisions burned?
The fire only entered Bulkley-Nechako C (2,289 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 24.0 °C, humidity dropped to 22 % and gusts hit 62 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 31, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the official burnt perimeter of Canada’s CWFIS (NBAC, Natural Resources Canada) or, for the current season and until NBAC publishes it, the one rebuilt by GWIS (Copernicus); from NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots; and from the administrative boundaries of Canada. It is not an official report.
How did the fires that started in similar weather in this area end?
Fires less than 250 km away that started since 2016 with a similar FWI, humidity and dry spell: 22. Their median duration was 70 days and their median area 4,785 ha; 36 % went past 10,000 ha. All of them had rain in the ten days after the end: the first rainy day brought a median of 3.6 mm.

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.

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 911.

How we know this
  • Perimeter: NBAC (Natural Resources Canada), official.
  • Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 30 July 2018 to 22 August 2018. 617 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: it comes from the National Burned Area Composite (NBAC) of the Canadian Wildland Fire Information System (CWFIS), Natural Resources Canada, which maps it on satellite imagery and publishes it under the Open Government Licence – Canada. Until NBAC publishes the current season, this year’s fires carry the perimeter rebuilt from heat detections by GWIS (Copernicus, CC BY 4.0), which is approximate. Heat detections come from the VIIRS sensors aboard Suomi-NPP and NOAA-20, distributed by NASA FIRMS at 375 m resolution. Census subdivision boundaries come from geoBoundaries ADM3 (Open Data Commons Open Database License 1.0). The area per census subdivision is computed by WorldFires by crossing the perimeter with those boundaries, so it may differ slightly from official figures.