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Central Desert fire, 6 July 2016 Central Desert, MacDonnell

Out · last detection 11 Jul 2016, 04:56 UTC

The fire started on 6 July 2016 in Central Desert, Australia, and satellites saw it burning for 6 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 6,391 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 2555th largest in Northern Territory since 2016 (of 3496 with a page). Number 297 in Australia in 2016, of 427.

Burnt area
6,391ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
6days
6 Jul 2016 – 11 Jul 2016
Municipalities hit
2
local government areas
Started on
6 Jul
2016
Heat detections
226
in a single hotspot: 388 MW
Danger at start
30
High · FWI index
Energy released
4.1GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

11 Jul 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 6 Jul11 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

67891011

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

The weather it burned in

30°high
58km/h · peak gust
17%lowest humidity

It had gone 9 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Central Desert where it started
    5,919 ha reached on 6 Jul
    0.0 %
  2. MacDonnell
    575 ha reached on 9 Jul
    0.0 %

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)
6 Jul 21.8 °C 28 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
7 Jul 25.3 °C 23 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
8 Jul 28.5 °C 21 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
9 Jul 29.6 °C 17 % 58 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
10 Jul 21.3 °C 37 % 36 km/h 0.3 mm High 33
11 Jul 20.5 °C 23 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
12 Jul after 15.0 °C 38 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
13 Jul after 17.9 °C 28 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
14 Jul after 17.2 °C 19 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
15 Jul after 19.2 °C 16 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
16 Jul after 19.1 °C 13 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
17 Jul after 20.7 °C 9 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
18 Jul after 23.8 °C 30 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
19 Jul after 25.0 °C 31 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
20 Jul after 27.0 °C 28 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
21 Jul after 28.6 °C 25 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 36

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 29 Jun 2016
After · 18 Jul 2016

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 · 226Every 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

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Central Desert fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 6 July 2016 and 11 July 2016: 6 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 6,391 hectares (63.9 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Central Desert (5,919 ha, 0.0 %); MacDonnell (575 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 29.6 °C, humidity dropped to 17 % and gusts hit 58 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 58, 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

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
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 000.

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.