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Cook fire, 23 August 2018 Cook

Out · last detection 9 Oct 2018, 03:43 UTC

The fire started on 23 August 2018 in Cook, Australia, and satellites saw it burning for 48 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 36,941 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 145th largest in Queensland since 2016 (of 1737 with a page). Number 48 in Australia in 2018, of 923.

Burnt area
36,941ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
48days
23 Aug 2018 – 9 Oct 2018
Municipalities hit
1
local government areas
Started on
23 Aug
2018
Heat detections
1,443
in a single hotspot: 237 MW
Danger at start
39
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
12.7GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

9 Oct 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 23 Aug9 Oct

How it evolved, day by day

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

The weather it burned in

36°high
66km/h · peak gust
24%lowest humidity

It had gone 19 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

65% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 23,964 ha in 2016, 1,704 ha in 2017. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 23,987 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Cook where it started
    36,921 ha reached on 23 Aug
    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)
23 Aug 32.1 °C 34 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
24 Aug 31.8 °C 37 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
25 Aug 31.3 °C 39 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
26 Aug 32.0 °C 35 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
27 Aug 32.3 °C 40 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
28 Aug 31.6 °C 39 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
29 Aug 32.9 °C 35 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
30 Aug 31.2 °C 31 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
31 Aug 33.5 °C 31 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
1 Sept 33.2 °C 33 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
2 Sept 33.5 °C 36 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
3 Sept 33.7 °C 28 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
4 Sept 33.3 °C 26 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
5 Sept 33.3 °C 31 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
6 Sept 32.2 °C 33 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
7 Sept 31.9 °C 37 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
8 Sept 31.5 °C 33 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
9 Sept 32.6 °C 29 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
10 Sept 31.7 °C 36 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
11 Sept 31.1 °C 40 % 53 km/h 0.4 mm Very high 41
12 Sept 30.2 °C 46 % 53 km/h 0.3 mm Very high 38
13 Sept 31.9 °C 36 % 59 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
14 Sept 31.6 °C 41 % 59 km/h 0.3 mm Very high 41
15 Sept 31.5 °C 43 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
16 Sept 33.2 °C 36 % 41 km/h 0.8 mm High 31
17 Sept 33.3 °C 29 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
18 Sept 31.8 °C 33 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
19 Sept 32.2 °C 31 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
20 Sept 33.9 °C 24 % 49 km/h 0.1 mm Very high 46
21 Sept 33.2 °C 35 % 55 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
22 Sept 31.6 °C 36 % 66 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
23 Sept 30.8 °C 37 % 56 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
24 Sept 31.7 °C 31 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
25 Sept 31.8 °C 32 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
26 Sept 31.4 °C 35 % 58 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
27 Sept 33.6 °C 28 % 59 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
28 Sept 31.8 °C 31 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
29 Sept 31.3 °C 32 % 57 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
30 Sept 31.8 °C 33 % 58 km/h 0.1 mm Very high 50
1 Oct 31.6 °C 35 % 64 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
2 Oct 32.1 °C 42 % 66 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
3 Oct 32.9 °C 37 % 59 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
4 Oct 33.9 °C 31 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
5 Oct 35.8 °C 26 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
6 Oct 34.9 °C 30 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
7 Oct 33.8 °C 34 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
8 Oct 33.8 °C 28 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
9 Oct 32.6 °C 35 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
10 Oct after 33.5 °C 33 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
11 Oct after 34.3 °C 36 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
12 Oct after 35.1 °C 34 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
13 Oct after 36.2 °C 32 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
14 Oct after 34.8 °C 39 % 44 km/h 0.2 mm Very high 41
15 Oct after 34.7 °C 42 % 48 km/h 0.1 mm Very high 38
16 Oct after 34.3 °C 37 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
17 Oct after 35.2 °C 30 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
18 Oct after 35.9 °C 25 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
19 Oct after 35.4 °C 25 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
20 Oct after 35.0 °C 32 % 46 km/h 0.3 mm Very high 46
21 Oct after 36.7 °C 25 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
22 Oct after 37.7 °C 25 % 40 km/h 0.5 mm Very high 44
23 Oct after 34.8 °C 34 % 37 km/h 0.2 mm Very high 42
24 Oct after 34.7 °C 29 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 16 Aug 2018
After · 16 Oct 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 · 1,443Every 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 Cook fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 23 August 2018 and 9 October 2018: 48 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 36,941 hectares (369.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Cook (36,921 ha, 0.4 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 36.2 °C, humidity dropped to 24 % and gusts hit 66 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 52, 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.