How long did the Dundas fire last?

GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 31 October 2019 and 18 November 2019: 19 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 18,503 hectares (185.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire only entered Dundas (18,454 ha, 0.2 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 44.3 °C, humidity dropped to 6 % and gusts hit 76 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 108, 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.

AU · Australia · 2019-10-31 → 2019-11-18

Dundas fire, 31 October 2019 Dundas

Out · last detection 18 Nov 2019, 05:25 UTC

The fire started on 31 October 2019 in Dundas, Australia, and satellites saw it burning for 19 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 18,503 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 406th largest in Western Australia since 2016 (of 2718 with a page). Number 179 in Australia in 2019, of 802.

Burnt area: 18,503ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 19days; 31 Oct 2019 – 18 Nov 2019
Municipalities hit: 1; local government areas
Started on: 31 Oct; 2019
Heat detections: 1,693; in a single hotspot: 555 MW
Danger at start: 108; Very extreme · FWI index
Energy released: 21.8GW; sum of detected power

Play back 18 Nov 2019

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 31 Oct18 Nov

How it evolved, day by day

123456789101112131415161718

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

The weather it burned in

44°high

76km/h · peak gust

6%lowest humidity

It had gone 17 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

Dundas where it started

18,454 ha reached on 1 Nov

0.2 %

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)
30 Oct	39.8 °C	7 %	76 km/h	0.0 mm	Very extreme 108
31 Oct	25.6 °C	17 %	72 km/h	1.1 mm	Extreme 64
1 Nov	22.1 °C	23 %	63 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 59
2 Nov	22.7 °C	24 %	53 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 48
3 Nov	26.6 °C	20 %	46 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 49
4 Nov	27.9 °C	21 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
5 Nov	33.8 °C	11 %	45 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 65
6 Nov	27.4 °C	20 %	43 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 56
7 Nov	28.5 °C	22 %	47 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 56
8 Nov	24.9 °C	31 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 45
9 Nov	29.7 °C	15 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 48
10 Nov	40.0 °C	6 %	56 km/h	0.0 mm	Very extreme 88
11 Nov	26.1 °C	23 %	47 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 59
12 Nov	23.8 °C	27 %	44 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 51
13 Nov	27.2 °C	17 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
14 Nov	33.3 °C	13 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 49
15 Nov	32.9 °C	14 %	48 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 64
16 Nov	35.8 °C	17 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 58
17 Nov	44.3 °C	7 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	Very extreme 74
18 Nov	37.7 °C	20 %	56 km/h	0.0 mm	Very extreme 78
19 Nov after	42.9 °C	8 %	56 km/h	0.0 mm	Very extreme 78
20 Nov after	25.4 °C	30 %	64 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 65
21 Nov after	25.7 °C	16 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
22 Nov after	31.1 °C	16 %	57 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 65
23 Nov after	31.4 °C	17 %	47 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 57
24 Nov after	34.2 °C	19 %	62 km/h	0.0 mm	Very extreme 73
25 Nov after	26.5 °C	24 %	48 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 54
26 Nov after	28.0 °C	18 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 45
27 Nov after	33.7 °C	13 %	60 km/h	0.0 mm	Very extreme 74
28 Nov after	27.9 °C	30 %	56 km/h	0.1 mm	Extreme 59
29 Nov after	24.9 °C	24 %	53 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 57
30 Nov after	23.0 °C	26 %	45 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 48
1 Dec after	28.7 °C	32 %	45 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 49
2 Dec after	30.2 °C	29 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 45
3 Dec after	33.5 °C	13 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 52
4 Dec after	40.0 °C	9 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 65

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 24 Oct 2019

After · 25 Nov 2019

Before After

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 · 1,693Every 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 time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

16,847 haDundas16 December 2021 · 11 days · 17 km away

All fires in Australia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Dundas fire last?: GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 31 October 2019 and 18 November 2019: 19 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 18,503 hectares (185.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire only entered Dundas (18,454 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 44.3 °C, humidity dropped to 6 % and gusts hit 76 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 108, 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

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · Copernicus ↗

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.

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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.

Where it burned