Skip to content
worldfires
en
AU · Australia · →

West Arnhem fire, 2 September 2018 West Arnhem

Out · last detection 14 Oct 2018, 16:37 UTC

The fire started on 2 September 2018 in West Arnhem, Australia, and satellites saw it burning for 42 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 19,254 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 647th largest in Northern Territory since 2016 (of 3514 with a page). Number 154 in Australia in 2018, of 923.

Compare with…

Suggestions: West Arnhem · 2016West Arnhem · 2017West Arnhem · 2022West Arnhem · 2019

Burnt area
19,254ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
42days
2 Sept 2018 – 13 Oct 2018
Municipalities hit
1
local government areas
Started on
2 Sept
2018
Heat detections
810
in a single hotspot: 0 MW
Danger at start
28
High · FWI index
Average daily power
123MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 2 Sept13 Oct
14 Oct 2018

How it evolved, day by day

2 Sept 2018 · 5 MW · 2 3 Sept 2018 · 48 MW · 9 4 Sept 2018 · 93 MW · 20 5 Sept 2018 · 165 MW · 22 6 Sept 2018 · 50 MW · 12 7 Sept 2018 · 44 MW · 10 8 Sept 2018 · 68 MW · 18 9 Sept 2018 · 138 MW · 24 10 Sept 2018 · 222 MW · 33 11 Sept 2018 · 197 MW · 22 12 Sept 2018 · 84 MW · 23 13 Sept 2018 · 122 MW · 24 14 Sept 2018 · 299 MW · 26 15 Sept 2018 · 357 MW · 34 16 Sept 2018 · 148 MW · 20 17 Sept 2018 · 131 MW · 25 18 Sept 2018 · 345 MW · 41 19 Sept 2018 · 81 MW · 11 20 Sept 2018 · 21 MW · 6 21 Sept 2018 · 201 MW · 14 22 Sept 2018 · 162 MW · 25 23 Sept 2018 · 30 MW · 9 24 Sept 2018 · 73 MW · 19 25 Sept 2018 · 309 MW · 50 26 Sept 2018 · 200 MW · 32 27 Sept 2018 · 41 MW · 6 28 Sept 2018 · 116 MW · 28 29 Sept 2018 · 87 MW · 19 30 Sept 2018 · 89 MW · 19 1 Oct 2018 · 124 MW · 23 2 Oct 2018 · 47 MW · 9 3 Oct 2018 · 122 MW · 12 4 Oct 2018 · 72 MW · 20 5 Oct 2018 · 170 MW · 26 6 Oct 2018 · 142 MW · 15 7 Oct 2018 · 140 MW · 16 8 Oct 2018 · 62 MW · 18 9 Oct 2018 · 96 MW · 15 10 Oct 2018 · 118 MW · 22 11 Oct 2018 · 43 MW · 7 12 Oct 2018 · 99 MW · 10 13 Oct 2018 · 78 MW · 7 14 Oct 2018 · 40 MW · 7
2 Sept 9 Sept 15 Sept 16 Sept 23 Sept 30 Sept 7 Oct 14 Oct

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

The weather it burned in

34°high
56km/h · peak gust
23%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

89% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 15,638 ha in 2016, 2,856 ha in 2017. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 17,067 ha that had burned before.

How big is it?

10 km
It burned the equivalent of 12% of the area of London (193 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. West Arnhem where it started
    19,231 ha
    0.4 %

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 2020
Built-up area< 0.1 ha
Residents< 20

Inside the perimeter there was no noticeable 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)
2 Sept 32.1 °C 41 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
3 Sept 33.3 °C 32 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
4 Sept 31.7 °C 37 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
5 Sept 32.1 °C 25 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
6 Sept 32.9 °C 31 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
7 Sept 31.3 °C 40 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
8 Sept 30.6 °C 45 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
9 Sept 30.9 °C 45 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
10 Sept 32.4 °C 33 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
11 Sept 32.2 °C 26 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
12 Sept 32.0 °C 33 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
13 Sept 31.7 °C 35 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
14 Sept 32.2 °C 31 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
15 Sept 32.8 °C 34 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
16 Sept 32.2 °C 39 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
17 Sept 33.1 °C 23 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
18 Sept 33.6 °C 26 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
19 Sept 31.1 °C 40 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
20 Sept 31.0 °C 41 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
21 Sept 31.8 °C 34 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
22 Sept 32.0 °C 37 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
23 Sept 32.0 °C 35 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
24 Sept 31.1 °C 42 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
25 Sept 32.1 °C 31 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
26 Sept 31.2 °C 42 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
27 Sept 30.9 °C 46 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
28 Sept 31.5 °C 42 % 49 km/h 0.2 mm High 35
29 Sept 30.3 °C 44 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
30 Sept 30.9 °C 36 % 56 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
1 Oct 30.1 °C 46 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
2 Oct 30.2 °C 50 % 54 km/h 0.4 mm High 33
3 Oct 31.1 °C 45 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
4 Oct 31.9 °C 42 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
5 Oct 32.4 °C 42 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
6 Oct 32.9 °C 40 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
7 Oct 33.2 °C 36 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
8 Oct 33.0 °C 31 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
9 Oct 32.7 °C 39 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
10 Oct 32.4 °C 40 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
11 Oct 33.4 °C 39 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
12 Oct 33.4 °C 43 % 41 km/h 0.3 mm High 35
13 Oct 33.3 °C 44 % 33 km/h 0.2 mm High 31
14 Oct after 34.5 °C 39 % 30 km/h 0.2 mm High 32
15 Oct after 32.8 °C 45 % 36 km/h 0.1 mm High 31
16 Oct after 31.2 °C 53 % 38 km/h 0.2 mm High 28
17 Oct after 32.3 °C 46 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
18 Oct after 32.2 °C 52 % 32 km/h 0.8 mm Moderate 20
19 Oct after 33.2 °C 53 % 30 km/h 0.5 mm Moderate 21
20 Oct after 34.0 °C 39 % 39 km/h 0.1 mm High 32
21 Oct after 33.7 °C 42 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
22 Oct after 34.2 °C 43 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
23 Oct after 34.5 °C 40 % 24 km/h 0.3 mm High 26

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 26 Aug 2018
After · 20 Oct 2018

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 · 0Every 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 West Arnhem fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 2 September 2018 and 13 October 2018: 42 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 19,254 hectares (192.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered West Arnhem (19,231 ha, 0.4 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 33.6 °C, humidity dropped to 23 % and gusts hit 56 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 44, 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 · 4 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
  1. Last day with fire: 14 October 2018 → 13 October 2018.
  2. Start date: 28 August 2018 → 2 September 2018.
  3. Last day with fire: 13 October 2018 → 14 October 2018.
  4. Start date: 2 September 2018 → 28 August 2018.

RSS Changes to this page

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.
  • Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. No 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.

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.