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AU · Australia · –

Roper Gulf fire, 12 October 2025 Roper Gulf

Out · last detection 8 Nov 2025, 16:29 UTC

The fire started on 12 October 2025 in Roper Gulf, Australia, and satellites saw it burning for 27 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 278,828 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.

This entry is probably a savanna fire in Australia’s tropical north, not a bushfire like those in the south of the country. Millions of hectares of northern savanna and grassland burn every year: much of it in burns lit on purpose early in the dry season (traditional fire management, parks and cattle stations), the rest in grass fires that return to the same ground every few years. This is our assumption, based on the location; it is not confirmed. That is why it is left out of the wildfire rankings.

GWIS near-real-time perimeter, from the layer that changed in October 2025: this fire is not compared with fires from earlier years, because since then the GWIS layer gives more and larger perimeters.

Burnt area
278,828ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
27days
12 Oct 2025 – 7 Nov 2025
Municipalities hit
1
local government areas
Started on
12 Oct
2025
Heat detections
7,830
in a single hotspot: 289 MW
Danger at start
17
Moderate · FWI index
Average daily power
3.0GW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 12 Oct7 Nov
8 Nov 2025

How it evolved, day by day

12 Oct 2025 · 86 MW · 4 13 Oct 2025 · 166 MW · 16 14 Oct 2025 · 369 MW · 41 16 Oct 2025 · 1,717 MW · 96 17 Oct 2025 · 5,874 MW · 338 18 Oct 2025 · 11,076 MW · 718 19 Oct 2025 · 11,599 MW · 1060 20 Oct 2025 · 9,753 MW · 1026 21 Oct 2025 · 6,017 MW · 678 22 Oct 2025 · 8,478 MW · 716 23 Oct 2025 · 2,562 MW · 462 24 Oct 2025 · 2,483 MW · 380 25 Oct 2025 · 3,194 MW · 439 26 Oct 2025 · 3,663 MW · 480 27 Oct 2025 · 6,359 MW · 514 28 Oct 2025 · 948 MW · 54 29 Oct 2025 · 211 MW · 24 30 Oct 2025 · 262 MW · 56 31 Oct 2025 · 968 MW · 132 1 Nov 2025 · 1,563 MW · 107 2 Nov 2025 · 1,384 MW · 172 3 Nov 2025 · 1,807 MW · 161 4 Nov 2025 · 291 MW · 31 5 Nov 2025 · 400 MW · 66 6 Nov 2025 · 146 MW · 25 7 Nov 2025 · 340 MW · 33 8 Nov 2025 · 1 MW · 1
12 Oct 19 Oct 25 Oct 31 Oct 6 Nov

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
48km/h · peak gust
15%lowest humidity

It had gone 0 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 18.0 mm on 15 Nov.

This area had burned before

67% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 12,244 ha in 2016, 83,064 ha in 2017, 2,142 ha in 2018, 15,947 ha in 2019, 45,974 ha in 2021, 4,978 ha in 2022, 96,768 ha in 2023, 29,116 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 187,121 ha that had burned before.

How big is it?

20 km
It burned the equivalent of 1.8 times the area of London (2,788 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
    281,784 ha
    1.5 %

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 2025
Built-up area0.98 ha
Residents< 20

Inside the perimeter there were about 0.98 hectares of built-up land and almost nobody lived there (GHSL 2025, 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. The GHSL 2025 epoch is a projection made from 2020 and earlier data.

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)
12 Oct 35.2 °C 40 % 36 km/h 6.6 mm Moderate 17
13 Oct 36.8 °C 36 % 30 km/h 4.9 mm Low 7
14 Oct 36.2 °C 36 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
15 Oct 35.7 °C 37 % 38 km/h 0.7 mm High 27
16 Oct 37.2 °C 29 % 32 km/h 0.1 mm High 32
17 Oct 38.3 °C 25 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
18 Oct 37.7 °C 27 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
19 Oct 37.9 °C 24 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
20 Oct 39.1 °C 17 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 64
21 Oct 38.2 °C 15 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
22 Oct 39.1 °C 19 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
23 Oct 40.3 °C 19 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
24 Oct 39.6 °C 23 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
25 Oct 41.0 °C 18 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
26 Oct 39.9 °C 17 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
27 Oct 39.7 °C 20 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
28 Oct 40.0 °C 25 % 42 km/h 1.2 mm Very high 47
29 Oct 37.3 °C 31 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
30 Oct 38.7 °C 25 % 37 km/h 0.2 mm Very high 45
31 Oct 39.3 °C 25 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
1 Nov 39.9 °C 21 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
2 Nov 40.3 °C 20 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
3 Nov 34.8 °C 39 % 37 km/h 0.5 mm Very high 48
4 Nov 34.7 °C 33 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
5 Nov 37.3 °C 19 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 63
6 Nov 37.4 °C 23 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
7 Nov 38.0 °C 30 % 36 km/h 0.2 mm Very high 46
8 Nov after 33.0 °C 40 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
9 Nov after 36.7 °C 31 % 38 km/h 0.2 mm Very high 40
10 Nov after 37.9 °C 19 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
11 Nov after 38.0 °C 13 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 74
12 Nov after 38.0 °C 8 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 65
13 Nov after 38.4 °C 15 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
14 Nov after 35.3 °C 30 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
15 Nov after 32.2 °C 58 % 28 km/h 18.0 mm Low 7

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 5 Oct 2025
After · 14 Nov 2025

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 23 October 2025 the air beside the fire reached 74 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 42: 2.8 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak74 µg/m³
Days over the guideline15 days
PM1076 µg/m³
Optical depth1.32
14 Oct20 Oct26 Oct1 Nov7 Nov
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 · 7,830Every 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?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 12 October 2025 to 7 November 2025 (27 days). The perimeter dates it from 16 October 2025 to 7 November 2025.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 278,828 hectares (2,788.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Roper Gulf (281,784 ha, 1.5 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 41.0 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 48 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 64, 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 · 1 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
  1. Start date: 16 October 2025 → 12 October 2025.

RSS Changes to this page With cross-checks and a citable version

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; 9 polygons grouped in this page.
  • Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 16 October 2025 to 7 November 2025. 7,830 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 2025, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.
  • Probably a vegetation burn: not counted in the totals.

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.