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Roper Gulf fire, 14 June 2019 Roper Gulf

Out · last detection 17 Jul 2019, 04:14 UTC

The fire started on 14 June 2019 in Roper Gulf, Australia, and satellites saw it burning for 34 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 12,188 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 1162th largest in Northern Territory since 2016 (of 3514 with a page). Number 315 in Australia in 2019, of 802.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Roper Gulf · 2022Roper Gulf · 2016Roper Gulf · 2025Roper Gulf · 2025

Burnt area
12,188ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
34days
14 Jun 2019 – 17 Jul 2019
Municipalities hit
1
local government areas
Started on
14 Jun
2019
Heat detections
736
in a single hotspot: 31 MW
Danger at start
39
Very high · FWI index
Average daily power
104MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 14 Jun17 Jul
17 Jul 2019

How it evolved, day by day

14 Jun 2019 · 117 MW · 39 15 Jun 2019 · 430 MW · 48 16 Jun 2019 · 323 MW · 41 17 Jun 2019 · 212 MW · 57 18 Jun 2019 · 269 MW · 49 19 Jun 2019 · 179 MW · 42 20 Jun 2019 · 153 MW · 30 21 Jun 2019 · 5 MW · 3 22 Jun 2019 · 17 MW · 8 23 Jun 2019 · 14 MW · 3 24 Jun 2019 · 34 MW · 10 25 Jun 2019 · 28 MW · 7 26 Jun 2019 · 142 MW · 37 27 Jun 2019 · 135 MW · 21 28 Jun 2019 · 103 MW · 17 29 Jun 2019 · 64 MW · 16 30 Jun 2019 · 46 MW · 11 1 Jul 2019 · 18 MW · 6 2 Jul 2019 · 21 MW · 5 3 Jul 2019 · 80 MW · 29 4 Jul 2019 · 152 MW · 30 5 Jul 2019 · 158 MW · 35 6 Jul 2019 · 175 MW · 40 7 Jul 2019 · 104 MW · 27 8 Jul 2019 · 108 MW · 27 9 Jul 2019 · 68 MW · 18 10 Jul 2019 · 120 MW · 17 11 Jul 2019 · 59 MW · 8 12 Jul 2019 · 20 MW · 6 13 Jul 2019 · 3 MW · 4 14 Jul 2019 · 30 MW · 8 15 Jul 2019 · 68 MW · 14 16 Jul 2019 · 58 MW · 16 17 Jul 2019 · 34 MW · 7
14 Jun 15 Jun 19 Jun 24 Jun 29 Jun 4 Jul 9 Jul 14 Jul

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

The weather it burned in

33°high
50km/h · peak gust
8%lowest humidity

It had gone 40 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

12% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,331 ha in 2016, 150 ha in 2017.

How big is it?

10 km
It burned the equivalent of 7.7% of the area of London (122 km² against 1,583 km²).

London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).

This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.

What happened to each town

  1. Roper Gulf where it started
    12,244 ha reached on 14 Jun
    0.1 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.

People and buildings inside the perimeter

GHSL 2020
Built-up area0.17 ha
Residents< 20

Inside the perimeter there were about 0.17 hectares of built-up land and almost nobody lived there (GHSL 2020, satellite-based estimate).

This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned.

Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu

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)
14 Jun 32.7 °C 30 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
15 Jun 31.8 °C 31 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
16 Jun 32.3 °C 27 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
17 Jun 31.8 °C 24 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
18 Jun 30.1 °C 17 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
19 Jun 27.5 °C 13 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
20 Jun 28.0 °C 14 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
21 Jun 27.7 °C 15 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
22 Jun 26.7 °C 16 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
23 Jun 27.0 °C 10 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
24 Jun 27.6 °C 8 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
25 Jun 28.1 °C 9 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
26 Jun 27.9 °C 14 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
27 Jun 28.8 °C 23 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
28 Jun 30.3 °C 29 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
29 Jun 31.7 °C 23 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
30 Jun 32.0 °C 31 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
1 Jul 30.9 °C 23 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
2 Jul 29.6 °C 24 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
3 Jul 29.1 °C 20 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
4 Jul 28.7 °C 16 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
5 Jul 29.4 °C 15 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
6 Jul 29.7 °C 23 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
7 Jul 29.8 °C 20 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
8 Jul 30.8 °C 21 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
9 Jul 30.7 °C 26 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
10 Jul 30.5 °C 23 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
11 Jul 30.4 °C 24 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
12 Jul 30.6 °C 26 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
13 Jul 30.1 °C 12 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
14 Jul 26.6 °C 21 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
15 Jul 26.2 °C 13 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
16 Jul 27.1 °C 11 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
17 Jul 28.4 °C 11 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
18 Jul after 30.0 °C 15 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
19 Jul after 30.5 °C 19 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
20 Jul after 31.7 °C 15 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
21 Jul after 31.2 °C 17 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
22 Jul after 31.3 °C 16 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
23 Jul after 31.9 °C 10 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
24 Jul after 31.4 °C 13 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
25 Jul after 31.1 °C 24 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
26 Jul after 30.2 °C 23 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
27 Jul after 30.6 °C 25 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
28 Jul after 31.0 °C 27 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
29 Jul after 31.6 °C 24 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
30 Jul after 32.3 °C 22 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
31 Jul after 32.2 °C 20 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
1 Aug after 30.8 °C 14 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
2 Aug after 28.3 °C 12 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 7 Jun 2019
After · 24 Jul 2019

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 · 736Every 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 Roper Gulf fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 14 June 2019 and 17 July 2019: 34 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 12,188 hectares (121.9 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Roper Gulf (12,244 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 32.7 °C, humidity dropped to 8 % and gusts hit 50 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 61, 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 · Emergency number and official warnings ›

Satellite cross-check

History of this page Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.

No changes since 24 October 2026.

RSS Changes to this page

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.

How we know this
  • Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery.
  • Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 736 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
  • We have not matched this page with any official record.
  • Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
  • Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2020, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.

How we build fire pages: methodology ›

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.