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Shaw Fire, June 2026 Southeast Fairbanks

Out · last measured on 20 Jun 2026

The fire started on 20 June 2026 in Southeast Fairbanks, United States, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC) mapped an official burnt perimeter of 1,400 hectares, spread across a single county.

It is the 289th largest in Alaska since 2016 (of 472 with a page). Number 225 in United States in 2026, of 423.

Burnt area
1,400ha
official perimeter (MTBS / NIFC)
Duration
1day
20 Jun 2026 – 20 Jun 2026
Municipalities hit
1
counties
Started on
20 Jun
2026
Heat detections
18
in a single hotspot: 29 MW
Danger at start
12
Moderate · FWI index

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 20 Jun20 Jun

The weather it burned in

24°high
26km/h · peak gust
33%lowest humidity

It had gone 2 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 17.4 mm on 23 Jun.

This area had burned before

3% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 43 ha in 2022.

What happened to each town

  1. Southeast Fairbanks where it started
    1,420 ha reached on 22 Jun
    0.0 %

Burnt area inside each county, from crossing the official 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)
20 Jun 23.9 °C 33 % 26 km/h 1.1 mm Moderate 12
21 Jun after 22.6 °C 40 % 25 km/h 2.3 mm Very low 4
22 Jun after 24.0 °C 36 % 26 km/h 2.1 mm Very low 5
23 Jun after 16.2 °C 72 % 34 km/h 17.4 mm Very low 0

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 13 Jun 2026
After · 27 Jun 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 24 June 2026 the air beside the fire reached 88 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 36: 2.4 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak88 µg/m³
Days over the guideline3 days
PM1089 µg/m³
Optical depth0.63
1819202122232425
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 · 18Every 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 United States ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Shaw fire last?
It burned between 20 June 2026 and 20 June 2026: 1 day, according to the start date recorded by United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC) and the heat detections seen by satellite.
How much area did it burn?
The official perimeter published by United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC) is 1,400 hectares (14.0 km²). Other tallies, such as daily incident reports, may give slightly different figures.
Which counties burned?
The fire only entered Southeast Fairbanks (1,420 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 24.0 °C, humidity dropped to 33 % and gusts hit 26 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 12, class Moderate.
Where does this data come from?
From the official burnt perimeter of United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC, public domain), NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of United States. 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: 911

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
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 911.

Where this data comes from

The perimeter is official and in the public domain. For past years it comes from MTBS (Monitoring Trends in Burn Severity), run by the U.S. Geological Survey and the USDA Forest Service, which map it on Landsat and Sentinel-2 imagery. For the current and last year it comes from WFIGS at the National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC): incident perimeters mapped by fire crews, aircraft and imagery. Heat detections come from the VIIRS sensors aboard Suomi-NPP and NOAA-20, distributed by NASA FIRMS at 375 m resolution. County boundaries come from geoBoundaries ADM2 (Public Domain). The area per county is computed by WorldFires by crossing the perimeter with those boundaries, so it may differ slightly from official figures.