Burke fire, 3 September 2026 Barkly, Burke, Mount Isa
The fire started on 3 September 2026 in Burke, Australia, and satellites saw it burning for 21 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 104,417 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.
This page is probably a fire complex, not a single fire. GWIS merges into one perimeter the fires that touch over weeks, which in large burning seasons can join dozens of separate fires. The total area is reliable; the origin and dates refer to the whole complex.
Other fire pages in the same area and on the same dates:
It is the 38th largest in Queensland since 2016 (of 1737 with a page). Number 8 in Australia in 2026, of 859.
Compare with…
- Burnt area
- 104,417ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 21days
- 3 Sept 2026 – 23 Sept 2026
- Municipalities hit
- 3
- local government areas
- Started on
- 3 Sept
- 2026
- Heat detections
- 2,356
- in a single hotspot: 244 MW
- Danger at start
- 48
- Very high · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 1.2GW
- 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 56 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
85% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 4,211 ha in 2016, 6,139 ha in 2017, 24,481 ha in 2018, 1,934 ha in 2020, 577 ha in 2021, 7,420 ha in 2022, 70,953 ha in 2023, 12,123 ha in 2024, 2,507 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 88,410 ha that had burned before.
- 25,636 ha Barkly fire, September 2023 43,494 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 23,563 ha Barkly fire, September 2023 40,762 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 6,551 ha Mount Isa fire, October 2024 79,327 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 5,532 ha Barkly fire, April 2018 7,676 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,462 ha Barkly fire, January 2022 8,005 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,940 ha Barkly fire, April 2018 10,064 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,227 ha Barkly fire, April 2023 5,056 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,477 ha Barkly fire, April 2018 9,652 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
-
66,902 ha reached on 7 Sept0.2 %
-
Burke where it started25,712 ha reached on 3 Sept0.6 %
-
11,745 ha reached on 6 Sept0.3 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3 Sept | 33.8 °C | 20 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 4 Sept | 35.5 °C | 18 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 56 |
| 5 Sept | 35.5 °C | 19 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 6 Sept | 36.0 °C | 17 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 7 Sept | 37.3 °C | 11 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 63 |
| 8 Sept | 37.4 °C | 14 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 61 |
| 9 Sept | 37.0 °C | 8 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 67 |
| 10 Sept | 36.3 °C | 13 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 66 |
| 11 Sept | 32.9 °C | 29 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 54 |
| 12 Sept | 33.5 °C | 28 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 13 Sept | 34.6 °C | 22 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 50 |
| 14 Sept | 33.3 °C | 20 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 15 Sept | 33.7 °C | 16 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 57 |
| 16 Sept | 34.5 °C | 13 % | 43 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 63 |
| 17 Sept | 35.0 °C | 18 % | 50 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 65 |
| 18 Sept | 32.5 °C | 21 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 62 |
| 19 Sept | 32.2 °C | 15 % | 49 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 63 |
| 20 Sept | 33.5 °C | 17 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 50 |
| 21 Sept | 35.3 °C | 12 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 59 |
| 22 Sept | 35.5 °C | 13 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 23 Sept | 33.9 °C | 18 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 60 |
| 24 Sept after | 35.3 °C | 14 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 56 |
| 25 Sept after | 31.4 °C | 35 % | 38 km/h | 0.1 mm | Very high 46 |
| 26 Sept after | 32.4 °C | 27 % | 40 km/h | 0.1 mm | Very high 46 |
| 27 Sept after | 35.2 °C | 17 % | 54 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 63 |
| 28 Sept after | 33.7 °C | 23 % | 50 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 62 |
| 29 Sept after | 32.8 °C | 25 % | 41 km/h | 0.2 mm | Extreme 55 |
| 30 Sept after | 33.5 °C | 29 % | 42 km/h | 0.1 mm | Extreme 54 |
| 1 Oct after | 33.7 °C | 28 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 2 Oct after | 35.2 °C | 25 % | 43 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 3 Oct after | 35.3 °C | 23 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
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 11 September 2026 the air beside the fire reached 141 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 87: 5.8 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 · 2,356Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 43,494 haBarkly28 September 2023 · 25 days · 12 km away
- 79,327 haMount Isa19 October 2024 · 15 days · 23 km away
- 28,500 haBurke8 August 2023 · 12 days · 25 km away
- 40,762 haBarkly26 September 2023 · 14 days · 32 km away
- 29,963 haBarkly14 April 2026 · 4 days · 32 km away
- 18,582 haBarkly28 August 2024 · 11 days · 38 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Burke fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 3 September 2026 and 23 September 2026: 21 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 104,417 hectares (1,044.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 3 municipalities: Barkly (66,902 ha, 0.2 %); Burke (25,712 ha, 0.6 %); Mount Isa (11,745 ha, 0.3 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 37.4 °C, humidity dropped to 8 % and gusts hit 50 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 67, class 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 · 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 from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 2,356 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.