How long did the Tenterfield fire last?

GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 4 September 2019 and 21 September 2019: 18 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 70,910 hectares (709.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 2 municipalities: Tenterfield (57,184 ha, 7.8 %); Clarence Valley (13,981 ha, 1.3 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 28.8 °C, humidity dropped to 9 % and gusts hit 89 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 41, class Very 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.

AU · Australia · 2019-09-04 → 2019-09-21

Tenterfield fire, September 2019 Tenterfield, Clarence Valley

Out · last detection 22 Sept 2019, 14:29 UTC

The fire started on 4 September 2019 in Tenterfield, Australia, and satellites saw it burning for 18 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 70,910 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 15th largest in New South Wales since 2016 (of 130 with a page). Number 36 in Australia in 2019, of 802.

Burnt area: 70,910ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 18days; 4 Sept 2019 – 21 Sept 2019
Municipalities hit: 2; local government areas
Started on: 4 Sept; 2019
Heat detections: 6,516; in a single hotspot: 575 MW
Danger at start: 2; Very low · FWI index
Energy released: 66.4GW; sum of detected power

Play back 22 Sept 2019

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 4 Sept21 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

45678910111213141516171819202122

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

The weather it burned in

29°high

89km/h · peak gust

9%lowest humidity

It had gone 0 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 8.2 mm on 30 Sept.

This area had burned before

16% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 691 ha in 2016, 10,650 ha in 2017, 905 ha in 2018. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 11,333 ha that had burned before.

2,266 ha Tenterfield fire, August 2017 8,469 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire

What happened to each town

Tenterfield where it started

57,184 ha reached on 4 Sept

7.8 %
Clarence Valley

13,981 ha reached on 6 Sept

1.3 %

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)
30 Aug	17.0 °C	43 %	33 km/h	4.4 mm	Very low 2
31 Aug	18.6 °C	40 %	36 km/h	0.3 mm	Very low 5
1 Sept	21.6 °C	36 %	42 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 12
2 Sept	24.2 °C	18 %	46 km/h	0.0 mm	High 23
3 Sept	23.2 °C	23 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	High 22
4 Sept	27.6 °C	18 %	59 km/h	0.0 mm	High 31
5 Sept	28.5 °C	13 %	46 km/h	0.0 mm	High 31
6 Sept	28.8 °C	10 %	65 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 41
7 Sept	20.6 °C	19 %	89 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
8 Sept	19.9 °C	21 %	56 km/h	0.0 mm	High 33
9 Sept	16.8 °C	19 %	79 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
10 Sept	19.6 °C	23 %	48 km/h	0.0 mm	High 30
11 Sept	18.8 °C	31 %	45 km/h	0.0 mm	High 27
12 Sept	23.6 °C	20 %	43 km/h	0.0 mm	High 28
13 Sept	24.6 °C	12 %	42 km/h	0.1 mm	High 34
14 Sept	27.8 °C	9 %	66 km/h	0.1 mm	Very high 41
15 Sept	24.8 °C	23 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	High 32
16 Sept	27.5 °C	15 %	42 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
17 Sept	23.0 °C	40 %	42 km/h	11.4 mm	Very low 2
18 Sept	20.1 °C	43 %	40 km/h	0.2 mm	Low 6
19 Sept	20.9 °C	43 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	Low 11
20 Sept	19.7 °C	59 %	26 km/h	3.1 mm	Very low 2
21 Sept	23.4 °C	39 %	42 km/h	0.6 mm	Low 6
22 Sept after	26.7 °C	33 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 15
23 Sept after	26.2 °C	26 %	53 km/h	0.0 mm	High 22
24 Sept after	21.1 °C	39 %	34 km/h	0.7 mm	Moderate 14
25 Sept after	20.0 °C	47 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 14
26 Sept after	20.1 °C	66 %	42 km/h	19.6 mm	Very low 0
27 Sept after	25.0 °C	31 %	45 km/h	0.1 mm	Very low 4
28 Sept after	25.6 °C	26 %	57 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 14
29 Sept after	26.7 °C	18 %	56 km/h	0.0 mm	High 22
30 Sept after	22.2 °C	43 %	43 km/h	8.2 mm	Very low 1

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 28 Aug 2019

After · 28 Sept 2019

Before After

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 · 6,516Every 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 time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Australia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Tenterfield fire last?: GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 4 September 2019 and 21 September 2019: 18 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 70,910 hectares (709.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 2 municipalities: Tenterfield (57,184 ha, 7.8 %); Clarence Valley (13,981 ha, 1.3 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 28.8 °C, humidity dropped to 9 % and gusts hit 89 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 41, class Very 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

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · Copernicus ↗

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.

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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.

Where it burned