Mackay fire, 4 November 2024 Mackay, Whitsunday
The fire started on 4 November 2024 in Mackay, Australia, and satellites saw it burning for 16 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 32,527 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.
It is the 172th largest in Queensland since 2016 (of 1737 with a page). Number 51 in Australia in 2024, of 638.
- Burnt area
- 32,527ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 16days
- 4 Nov 2024 – 19 Nov 2024
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- local government areas
- Started on
- 4 Nov
- 2024
- Heat detections
- 949
- in a single hotspot: 58 MW
- Danger at start
- 22
- High · FWI index
- Energy released
- 7.7GW
- sum of detected power
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 6 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 2.0 mm on 29 Nov.
This area had burned before
54% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 3,080 ha in 2016, 9,342 ha in 2017, 3,060 ha in 2021, 8,881 ha in 2022. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 17,425 ha that had burned before.
- 8,335 ha Whitsunday fire, October 2022 18,287 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 5,456 ha Mackay fire, January 2017 8,241 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,060 ha Mackay fire, October 2021 6,014 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 4 ha Mackay fire, October 2017 9,477 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Mackay where it started22,147 ha reached on 1 Nov2.9 %
-
10,514 ha reached on 1 Nov0.4 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 29 Oct | 29.7 °C | 40 % | 46 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 22 |
| 30 Oct | 29.2 °C | 30 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 31 Oct | 28.9 °C | 38 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 1 Nov | 30.4 °C | 39 % | 35 km/h | 1.2 mm | Moderate 14 |
| 2 Nov | 27.5 °C | 49 % | 39 km/h | 0.5 mm | Moderate 17 |
| 3 Nov | 27.2 °C | 48 % | 51 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 19 |
| 4 Nov | 29.4 °C | 39 % | 45 km/h | 0.2 mm | High 22 |
| 5 Nov | 29.3 °C | 42 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 6 Nov | 29.9 °C | 38 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 7 Nov | 31.9 °C | 33 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 8 Nov | 33.7 °C | 34 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 9 Nov | 32.5 °C | 40 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 10 Nov | 29.6 °C | 49 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 11 Nov | 28.8 °C | 50 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 23 |
| 12 Nov | 31.9 °C | 40 % | 45 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 25 |
| 13 Nov | 31.8 °C | 38 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 14 Nov | 32.1 °C | 41 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 15 Nov | 30.1 °C | 49 % | 39 km/h | 1.5 mm | Moderate 14 |
| 16 Nov | 29.5 °C | 46 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 23 |
| 17 Nov | 29.4 °C | 45 % | 52 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 18 Nov | 30.1 °C | 39 % | 48 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 19 Nov | 28.7 °C | 39 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 20 Nov after | 26.2 °C | 62 % | 48 km/h | 2.6 mm | Low 8 |
| 21 Nov after | 25.5 °C | 60 % | 52 km/h | 0.2 mm | Moderate 15 |
| 22 Nov after | 26.3 °C | 60 % | 56 km/h | 5.5 mm | Low 5 |
| 23 Nov after | 27.1 °C | 56 % | 52 km/h | 0.6 mm | Low 10 |
| 24 Nov after | 27.6 °C | 51 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 16 |
| 25 Nov after | 28.5 °C | 46 % | 43 km/h | 0.1 mm | Moderate 18 |
| 26 Nov after | 29.4 °C | 43 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 27 Nov after | 30.2 °C | 44 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 28 Nov after | 30.5 °C | 44 % | 42 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 21 |
| 29 Nov after | 28.8 °C | 55 % | 41 km/h | 2.0 mm | Low 8 |
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 8 November 2024 the air beside the fire reached 63 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 29: 2.0 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 · 949Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 18,287 haWhitsundayOctober 2022 · 16 days · 3 km away
- 8,241 haMackayJanuary 2017 · 10 days · 3 km away
- 6,014 haMackayOctober 2021 · 15 days · 13 km away
- 9,477 haMackayOctober 2017 · 8 days · 14 km away
- 6,071 haMackay16 November 2024 · 4 days · 16 km away
- 9,350 haWhitsunday2 December 2023 · 9 days · 31 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Mackay fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 4 November 2024 and 19 November 2024: 16 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 32,527 hectares (325.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Mackay (22,147 ha, 2.9 %); Whitsunday (10,514 ha, 0.4 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 33.7 °C, humidity dropped to 30 % and gusts hit 56 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 27, class High.
- 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
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.