Burned area
satellite only10,328ha
Perimeter published by GWIS (Copernicus).
- Source
- GWIS (Copernicus)
- Date
- 7 May 2018 – 6 Jun 2018
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page to compare it with.
AU · Australia · –
Unincorporated NT fire, 7 May 2018 Coomalie, Unincorporated NT
Out · last detection 6 Jun 2018, 04:26 UTC
The fire started on 7 May 2018 in Unincorporated NT, Australia, and satellites saw it burning for 31 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 10,328 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.
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.
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Fire page data · version 2026-10-26matches the official recordwith caveatssatellite onlymodel
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Tick the figures you want: they make up the lede and the CSV.
Duration by satellite
satellite only31days
7 May 2018 to 6 Jun 2018: first and last day with fire on the page.
- Source
- GWIS (Copernicus) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- last detection: 6 Jun 2018, 04:26 UTC
+− cross-check
Satellites pass a few times a day and cloud or smoke can hide the fire: a lack of detections is not an official extinction. Each country’s emergency service declares a fire contained or out.
Start
satellite only7 May 2018
First day with fire seen by the satellites or the perimeter.
- Source
- GWIS (Copernicus) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- 7 May 2018
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page, so the alert time and the cause are not known here.
Hotspots
satellite only362
VIIRS detections at 375 m. Most intense hotspot: 32 MW.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (Suomi NPP)
- Date
- 7 May 2018 – 6 Jun 2018
+− cross-check
There is no official record to compare with. Each hotspot is a pixel detected in one satellite pass, not a separate fire.
The worst day
satellite only585MW
Total radiative power on 15 May 2018; hotspots that day: 91.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (FRP)
- Date
- 15 May 2018
+− cross-check
Fire radiative power (FRP) measures the energy the fire gives off when the satellite passes. Added up by day, it compares intensity, not area.
Danger at the start
model33.4FWI · high
Fire Weather Index (Canadian system) computed by WorldFires for the day the fire started. Consecutive days without rain before: 23.
- Source
- WorldFires calculation (Canadian FWI system)
- Date
- 7 May 2018, local noon
- Model
- ERA5 0,25° (ECMWF · Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com
+− cross-check
This is an index computed from weather model data, not a measurement of the fire nor an official warning. Danger warnings are issued by each country’s authority. Emergency number and official warnings
Weather during the fire
model33.4°C · 28% RH
High of 33.4 °C and minimum humidity of 28% on 8 May 2018; gusts of 53 km/h on 30 May 2018.
- Source
- weather model at the fire’s grid cell
- Date
- 7 May 2018 – 6 Jun 2018
- Model
- ERA5 0,25° (ECMWF · Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com
+− cross-check
These are model values for a cell of about 25 km, not from a weather station: they may differ from what was measured on the ground.
This page’s change log has been kept since 24 October 2026: every night what it publishes is compared and the difference is logged. Anything earlier is reconstructed from each source’s date and marked as reconstructed.
Show
-
· reconstructed weatherWeather and FWI computed from the ERA5 reanalysis
-
logLast day with fire: 31 May 2018 → 6 June 2018.
-
logStart date: 13 May 2018 → 7 May 2018.
-
· reconstructed GHSLPopulation and built-up area computed
What was saved on 26 October 2026
Every night a snapshot of what the page shows is saved. If anything changes, it appears in the list as a log entry.
- Area
- 10,328 ha
- Dates
- 7 May 2018 – 6 Jun 2018
- Name
- Unincorporated NT
- Official record
- —
Versioned permanent link
https://worldfires.org/en/fire/unincorporated-nt-2018-05-2?v=2026-10-26A version keeps the area, dates, name and official record; the area as it was logged (changes under 2% are not logged). The map, hotspots and weather always show today’s data.
Citation
A lede of about 60 words figures only, no adjectives
CSV for this fire unincorporated-nt-2018-05-2.csv · daily, no individual hotspots
| fecha | focos_viirs | frp_mw | tmax_c | tmin_c | hr_min_pct | viento_max_kmh | racha_max_kmh | precip_mm | fwi | clase_fwi | dentro_del_incendio |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2018-05-07 | 1 | 1 | 32.8 | 18.6 | 28 | 18.3 | 40.7 | 0 | 33.4 | alto | 1 |
| 2018-05-08 | 8 | 37 | 33.4 | 19.1 | 28 | 16.3 | 39.2 | 0 | 32.3 | alto | 1 |
| 2018-05-09 | 0 | 0 | 32.7 | 19.8 | 25 | 18.5 | 44.6 | 0 | 35.4 | alto | 1 |
| 2018-05-10 | 0 | 0 | 32.9 | 20 | 26 | 17.3 | 41.4 | 0 | 34.9 | alto | 1 |
| 2018-05-11 | 6 | 15 | 32.1 | 19.9 | 23 | 21.3 | 46.1 | 0 | 39.8 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2018-05-12 | 0 | 0 | 28.7 | 20.3 | 21 | 21.2 | 46.1 | 0 | 40.2 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2018-05-13 | 3 | 4 | 29.1 | 17.7 | 19 | 21.5 | 44.3 | 0 | 41.8 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2018-05-14 | 44 | 166 | 29.4 | 16.5 | 20 | 18.8 | 43.9 | 0 | 39.7 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2018-05-15 | 91 | 585 | 29 | 16.3 | 17 | 21.2 | 47.5 | 0 | 43.6 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2018-05-16 | 28 | 94 | 28.5 | 15.8 | 17 | 20.9 | 47.5 | 0 | 43.8 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2018-05-17 | 16 | 71 | 28.3 | 14.9 | 18 | 23.8 | 51.5 | 0 | 47.4 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2018-05-18 | 15 | 30 | 29.2 | 14.7 | 23 | 21.1 | 48.2 | 0 | 45 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2018-05-19 | 10 | 27 | 29.1 | 16.2 | 23 | 19.8 | 43.6 | 0 | 44.1 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2018-05-20 | 11 | 41 | 30.6 | 17.4 | 33 | 18.9 | 41.4 | 0 | 38.7 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2018-05-21 | 5 | 14 | 31.5 | 19.1 | 31 | 20.1 | 47.2 | 0 | 40.2 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2018-05-22 | 21 | 52 | 30.5 | 20.4 | 25 | 22.2 | 47.9 | 0 | 42.6 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2018-05-23 | 11 | 31 | 31.2 | 19.9 | 28 | 18.8 | 43.6 | 0 | 39.7 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2018-05-24 | 13 | 63 | 32.1 | 19 | 28 | 14.2 | 34.2 | 0 | 35.9 | alto | 1 |
| 2018-05-25 | 18 | 215 | 32 | 19.3 | 36 | 13.7 | 38.5 | 0 | 33.6 | alto | 1 |
| 2018-05-26 | 4 | 22 | 32.4 | 19.2 | 34 | 13.6 | 36.7 | 0 | 33.8 | alto | 1 |
| 2018-05-27 | 1 | 2 | 32 | 19.6 | 28 | 11.7 | 28.8 | 0 | 32.6 | alto | 1 |
| 2018-05-28 | 7 | 37 | 31.6 | 20.3 | 31 | 13.5 | 34.9 | 0 | 34.3 | alto | 1 |
| 2018-05-29 | 7 | 25 | 31.9 | 18.1 | 25 | 17.2 | 38.5 | 0 | 38.4 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2018-05-30 | 5 | 12 | 31.2 | 17.2 | 28 | 25 | 52.6 | 0 | 46.5 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2018-05-31 | 2 | 6 | 31.2 | 19.7 | 27 | 20.3 | 44.3 | 0 | 42 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2018-06-01 | 6 | 31 | 31 | 20.4 | 29 | 15.7 | 37.8 | 0 | 37.9 | alto | 1 |
| 2018-06-02 | 0 | 0 | 30.4 | 18.5 | 29 | 16.7 | 38.5 | 0 | 39.1 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2018-06-03 | 6 | 6 | 29.7 | 15.4 | 20 | 15.9 | 37.8 | 0 | 39.9 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2018-06-04 | 3 | 14 | 28.9 | 14.3 | 16 | 17.1 | 37.8 | 0 | 43.7 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2018-06-05 | 14 | 34 | 28.3 | 14 | 17 | 14.7 | 37.4 | 0 | 41.6 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2018-06-06 | 6 | 25 | 28.8 | 13.3 | 15 | 13.7 | 32.8 | 0 | 41.5 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2018-06-07 | 0 | 0 | 29.4 | 15.5 | 31 | 12.2 | 28.4 | 0 | 35.8 | alto | 0 |
| 2018-06-08 | 0 | 0 | 30.3 | 16.1 | 34 | 12.4 | 31 | 0 | 34.2 | alto | 0 |
| 2018-06-09 | 0 | 0 | 30.4 | 17.9 | 40 | 12.6 | 28.8 | 0 | 31.3 | alto | 0 |
| 2018-06-10 | 0 | 0 | 31.6 | 18 | 27 | 13 | 33.5 | 0 | 34 | alto | 0 |
| 2018-06-11 | 0 | 0 | 31.1 | 16.4 | 31 | 8.7 | 25.9 | 0 | 30.8 | alto | 0 |
| 2018-06-12 | 0 | 0 | 31.7 | 17.1 | 39 | 10.1 | 27 | 0 | 30.5 | alto | 0 |
| 2018-06-13 | 0 | 0 | 31.1 | 19.7 | 41 | 9.5 | 20.5 | 0 | 28.8 | alto | 0 |
| 2018-06-14 | 0 | 0 | 31.4 | 19.3 | 40 | 8.7 | 23 | 0 | 28.4 | alto | 0 |
| 2018-06-15 | 0 | 0 | 31 | 21.1 | 32 | 16.2 | 38.2 | 0 | 34.3 | alto | 0 |
| 2018-06-16 | 0 | 0 | 31 | 20.4 | 33 | 22.1 | 50.8 | 0 | 39.8 | muy_alto | 0 |
It is generated in your browser from this page’s data: one file per fire, aggregated by day and without individual hotspots.
Live widget for your story
It updates itself while the fire is still active and links to this page. Free, with the attribution shown at the bottom.
Sources for this page: GWIS (Copernicus), NASA FIRMS (VIIRS), ERA5 (ECMWF/Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0), GHSL (JRC). Open-Meteo.com · How we build fire pages: methodology
- Burnt area
- 10,328ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 31days
- 7 May 2018 – 6 Jun 2018
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- local government areas
- Started on
- 7 May
- 2018
- Heat detections
- 362
- in a single hotspot: 32 MW
- Danger at start
- 33
- High · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 62MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
HOTSPOTS BY DAY
7 May6 Jun
6 Jun 2018
How it evolved, day by day
7 May
15 May
22 May
28 May
4 Jun
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
53km/h · peak gust
15%lowest humidity
It had gone 23 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
60% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 5,713 ha in 2016, 2,696 ha in 2017. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 6,219 ha that had burned before.
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
Berlin boundary: geoBoundaries · Federal Agency for Cartography and Geodesy (dl-de/by-2-0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
10,339 ha reached on 8 May5.0 %
-
Unincorporated NT where it started58 ha reached on 7 May0.0 %
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 2020Built-up area0.32 ha
Residents< 20
Inside the perimeter there were about 0.32 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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 7 May | 32.8 °C | 28 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 8 May | 33.4 °C | 28 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 9 May | 32.7 °C | 25 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 35 |
| 10 May | 32.9 °C | 26 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 35 |
| 11 May | 32.1 °C | 23 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 12 May | 28.7 °C | 21 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 13 May | 29.1 °C | 19 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 14 May | 29.4 °C | 20 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 15 May | 29.0 °C | 17 % | 48 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 16 May | 28.5 °C | 17 % | 48 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 17 May | 28.3 °C | 18 % | 52 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 18 May | 29.2 °C | 23 % | 48 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 19 May | 29.1 °C | 23 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 20 May | 30.6 °C | 33 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 21 May | 31.5 °C | 31 % | 47 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 22 May | 30.5 °C | 25 % | 48 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 23 May | 31.2 °C | 28 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 24 May | 32.1 °C | 28 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 25 May | 32.0 °C | 36 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 26 May | 32.4 °C | 34 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 27 May | 32.0 °C | 28 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 28 May | 31.6 °C | 31 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 29 May | 31.9 °C | 25 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 38 |
| 30 May | 31.2 °C | 28 % | 53 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 31 May | 31.2 °C | 27 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 1 Jun | 31.0 °C | 29 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 38 |
| 2 Jun | 30.4 °C | 29 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 3 Jun | 29.7 °C | 20 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 4 Jun | 28.9 °C | 16 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 5 Jun | 28.3 °C | 17 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 6 Jun | 28.8 °C | 15 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 7 Jun after | 29.4 °C | 31 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 8 Jun after | 30.3 °C | 34 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 9 Jun after | 30.4 °C | 40 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 10 Jun after | 31.6 °C | 27 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 11 Jun after | 31.1 °C | 31 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 12 Jun after | 31.7 °C | 39 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 13 Jun after | 31.1 °C | 41 % | 20 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 14 Jun after | 31.4 °C | 40 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 15 Jun after | 31.0 °C | 32 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 16 Jun after | 31.0 °C | 33 % | 51 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
↔
Before · 30 Apr 2018
After · 13 Jun 2018
Sentinel-2 did not pass over on that day. Try another date, or use false colour, which is daily.
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 · 362Every 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
- 25,663 haCoomalieJune 2022 · 15 days · 11 km away
- 23,800 haCoomalieJuly 2020 · 23 days · 19 km away
- 33,864 haCoomalieJuly 2026 · 29 days · 20 km away
- 29,495 haUnincorporated NT10 July 2016 · 27 days · 21 km away
- 20,966 haUnincorporated NT12 June 2025 · 11 days · 21 km away
- 27,639 haVictoria Daly27 August 2020 · 6 days · 25 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Unincorporated NT fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 7 May 2018 to 6 June 2018 (31 days). The perimeter dates it from 13 May 2018 to 31 May 2018.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 10,328 hectares (103.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Coomalie (10,339 ha, 5.0 %); Unincorporated NT (58 ha, 0.0 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 33.4 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 53 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 47, 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 · Emergency number and official warnings
Satellite cross-check
History of this page · 2 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
- Last day with fire: 31 May 2018 → 6 June 2018.
- Start date: 13 May 2018 → 7 May 2018.
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
How we know this
- Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery.
- Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 13 May 2018 to 31 May 2018. 362 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.
- Probably a vegetation burn: not counted in the totals.
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.