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Central Desert fire, 1 October 2023 Central Desert

Out · last detection 14 Oct 2023, 16:02 UTC

The fire started on 1 October 2023 in Central Desert, Australia, and satellites saw it burning for 14 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 100,744 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

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.

It is the 56th largest in Northern Territory since 2016 (of 3493 with a page). Number 35 in Australia in 2023, of 1235.

Burnt area
100,744ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
14days
1 Oct 2023 – 14 Oct 2023
Municipalities hit
1
local government areas
Started on
1 Oct
2023
Heat detections
4,894
in a single hotspot: 427 MW
Danger at start
74
Very extreme · FWI index
Energy released
103.8GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

14 Oct 2023
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 1 Oct14 Oct

How it evolved, day by day

1234567891011121314

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

The weather it burned in

41°high
58km/h · peak gust
5%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

17% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 6,598 ha in 2016, 7,997 ha in 2017, 546 ha in 2018, 2,551 ha in 2021.

What happened to each town

  1. Central Desert where it started
    100,887 ha reached on 1 Oct
    0.4 %

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)
27 Sept 37.1 °C 10 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 74
28 Sept 36.6 °C 11 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 82
29 Sept 36.0 °C 12 % 57 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 87
30 Sept 36.8 °C 12 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 62
1 Oct 39.2 °C 9 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 69
2 Oct 39.0 °C 13 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 72
3 Oct 39.7 °C 10 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 77
4 Oct 33.8 °C 9 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 78
5 Oct 33.0 °C 7 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 82
6 Oct 32.7 °C 8 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 81
7 Oct 31.9 °C 9 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 80
8 Oct 32.4 °C 12 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 74
9 Oct 33.8 °C 9 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 68
10 Oct 34.0 °C 8 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 71
11 Oct 35.6 °C 7 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 67
12 Oct 38.0 °C 6 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 70
13 Oct 37.2 °C 9 % 55 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 84
14 Oct 35.2 °C 9 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 78
15 Oct after 34.5 °C 7 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 71
16 Oct after 35.2 °C 8 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 80
17 Oct after 35.0 °C 9 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 78
18 Oct after 35.4 °C 7 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 69
19 Oct after 36.9 °C 5 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 59
20 Oct after 38.2 °C 5 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
21 Oct after 41.0 °C 5 % 58 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 89
22 Oct after 39.6 °C 8 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 75
23 Oct after 40.5 °C 10 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 79
24 Oct after 41.5 °C 12 % 52 km/h 0.5 mm Very extreme 89
25 Oct after 38.8 °C 13 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 71
26 Oct after 35.6 °C 11 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 81
27 Oct after 35.5 °C 7 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 77
28 Oct after 35.7 °C 4 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 72
29 Oct after 37.5 °C 4 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 67
30 Oct after 40.5 °C 5 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 69
31 Oct after 41.8 °C 8 % 34 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.

Before · 24 Sept 2023
After · 21 Oct 2023

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 · Copernicus

On 5 October 2023 the air beside the fire reached 104 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 46: 3.1 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak104 µg/m³
Days over the guideline4 days
PM10150 µg/m³
Optical depth1.55
29301234567891011121314151617
Good Fair Moderate Poor Very poor Extremely poor

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 · 4,894Every 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 Australia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Central Desert fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 1 October 2023 and 14 October 2023: 14 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 100,744 hectares (1,007.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Central Desert (100,887 ha, 0.4 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 41.0 °C, humidity dropped to 5 % and gusts hit 58 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 89, 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
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.