Skip to content
worldfires
en
AU · Australia · –

Roper Gulf fire, 7 September 2026 Roper Gulf

Out · last detection 20 Oct 2026, 04:21 UTC

The fire started on 7 September 2026 in Roper Gulf, Australia, and satellites saw it burning for 44 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 251,971 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.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Roper Gulf · 2017Roper Gulf · 2019Roper Gulf · 2023Roper Gulf · 2024

Burnt area
251,971ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
44days
7 Sept 2026 – 20 Oct 2026
Municipalities hit
1
local government areas
Started on
7 Sept
2026
Heat detections
5,273
in a single hotspot: 354 MW
Danger at start
43
Very high · FWI index
Average daily power
1.2GW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 7 Sept20 Oct
20 Oct 2026

How it evolved, day by day

7 Sept 2026 · 8 MW · 4 8 Sept 2026 · 734 MW · 72 9 Sept 2026 · 798 MW · 82 10 Sept 2026 · 659 MW · 104 11 Sept 2026 · 300 MW · 59 12 Sept 2026 · 567 MW · 87 13 Sept 2026 · 643 MW · 81 14 Sept 2026 · 410 MW · 55 15 Sept 2026 · 1,610 MW · 122 16 Sept 2026 · 3,423 MW · 204 17 Sept 2026 · 1,417 MW · 189 18 Sept 2026 · 734 MW · 108 19 Sept 2026 · 795 MW · 130 20 Sept 2026 · 885 MW · 137 21 Sept 2026 · 2,869 MW · 250 22 Sept 2026 · 2,733 MW · 262 23 Sept 2026 · 2,544 MW · 216 24 Sept 2026 · 693 MW · 188 25 Sept 2026 · 1,716 MW · 203 26 Sept 2026 · 990 MW · 89 28 Sept 2026 · 278 MW · 43 29 Sept 2026 · 986 MW · 137 30 Sept 2026 · 328 MW · 51 1 Oct 2026 · 932 MW · 56 2 Oct 2026 · 536 MW · 52 3 Oct 2026 · 58 MW · 49 4 Oct 2026 · 2,633 MW · 311 5 Oct 2026 · 4,579 MW · 320 6 Oct 2026 · 3,732 MW · 261 7 Oct 2026 · 2,218 MW · 242 8 Oct 2026 · 2,259 MW · 276 9 Oct 2026 · 307 MW · 17 10 Oct 2026 · 1,593 MW · 217 11 Oct 2026 · 2,538 MW · 274 12 Oct 2026 · 1,964 MW · 171 13 Oct 2026 · 15 MW · 10 14 Oct 2026 · 803 MW · 81 15 Oct 2026 · 28 MW · 4 16 Oct 2026 · 118 MW · 22 17 Oct 2026 · 5 MW · 1 18 Oct 2026 · 691 MW · 30 19 Oct 2026 · 112 MW · 6 20 Oct 2026 · 0 MW · 0
7 Sept 16 Sept 25 Sept 5 Oct 14 Oct

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

Fire front film How it spread from one satellite pass to the next (159 passes) and with what wind. Watch the film

The weather it burned in

40°high
53km/h · peak gust
15%lowest humidity

It had gone 4 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 5.8 mm on 23 Oct.

This area had burned before

47% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 974 ha in 2016, 39,407 ha in 2017, 8,661 ha in 2018, 37,414 ha in 2019, 6,149 ha in 2020, 36,407 ha in 2021, 17,637 ha in 2022, 44,375 ha in 2023, 33,562 ha in 2024, 11,797 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 119,592 ha that had burned before.

How big is it?

20 km
It burned the equivalent of 1.6 times the area of London (2,520 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
    254,170 ha reached on 7 Sept
    1.4 %

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 area< 0.1 ha
Residents< 20

Inside the perimeter there was no noticeable 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)
7 Sept 36.5 °C 21 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
8 Sept 37.5 °C 16 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
9 Sept 35.9 °C 28 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
10 Sept 34.8 °C 25 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
11 Sept 33.7 °C 35 % 44 km/h 0.1 mm Extreme 56
12 Sept 33.8 °C 28 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 62
13 Sept 35.4 °C 22 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 70
14 Sept 34.5 °C 24 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 72
15 Sept 35.3 °C 19 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 78
16 Sept 34.8 °C 15 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 85
17 Sept 35.2 °C 17 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 78
18 Sept 32.7 °C 32 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 70
19 Sept 32.2 °C 34 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 74
20 Sept 32.4 °C 29 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
21 Sept 34.4 °C 18 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
22 Sept 35.1 °C 18 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
23 Sept 35.3 °C 18 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 69
24 Sept 34.5 °C 22 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 78
25 Sept 35.2 °C 19 % 50 km/h 0.1 mm Extreme 64
26 Sept 33.9 °C 30 % 45 km/h 0.1 mm Extreme 63
27 Sept 33.7 °C 30 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
28 Sept 34.1 °C 24 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
29 Sept 34.9 °C 24 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 64
30 Sept 34.2 °C 36 % 47 km/h 0.2 mm Very high 47
1 Oct 33.7 °C 39 % 51 km/h 0.6 mm Extreme 51
2 Oct 34.3 °C 29 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
3 Oct 35.2 °C 24 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 65
4 Oct 35.5 °C 23 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
5 Oct 36.0 °C 22 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
6 Oct 37.6 °C 21 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
7 Oct 38.0 °C 22 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
8 Oct 37.8 °C 23 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
9 Oct 37.9 °C 25 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
10 Oct 37.8 °C 26 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
11 Oct 38.8 °C 24 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
12 Oct 39.7 °C 23 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
13 Oct 39.9 °C 25 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
14 Oct 37.9 °C 30 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
15 Oct 36.7 °C 31 % 39 km/h 0.1 mm Extreme 51
16 Oct 38.6 °C 29 % 36 km/h 0.1 mm Very high 48
17 Oct 37.3 °C 32 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
18 Oct 38.2 °C 28 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
19 Oct 37.8 °C 26 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
20 Oct 38.7 °C 26 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
21 Oct after 37.4 °C 29 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
22 Oct after 39.0 °C 25 % 36 km/h 0.2 mm Very high 47
23 Oct after 38.3 °C 30 % 34 km/h 5.8 mm Very high 49

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 31 Aug 2026
After · 27 Oct 2026

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 22 September 2026 the air beside the fire reached 53 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 22: 1.5 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak53 µg/m³
Days over the guideline2 days
PM1054 µg/m³
Optical depth0.32
5 Sept11 Sept17 Sept23 Sept29 Sept
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 · 5,273Every 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 7 September 2026 and 20 October 2026: 44 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 251,971 hectares (2,519.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Roper Gulf (254,170 ha, 1.4 %).
Is the Roper Gulf fire still active?
No fire detections since 20 Oct 2026, 04:21 UTC. A lack of detections is not an official extinction.
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 39.9 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 53 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 85, 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 · 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 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; 6 polygons grouped in this page.
  • Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 5,273 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.