How long did the Western Downs fire last?

GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 15 July 2023 and 23 July 2023: 9 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 5,945 hectares (59.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 2 municipalities: Western Downs (4,685 ha, 0.1 %); Toowoomba (1,314 ha, 0.1 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 25.2 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 48 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 32, class 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 · 2023-07-15 → 2023-07-23

Western Downs fire, 15 July 2023 Western Downs, Toowoomba

Out · last detection 23 Jul 2023, 04:04 UTC

The fire started on 15 July 2023 in Western Downs, Australia, and satellites saw it burning for 9 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 5,945 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 1418th largest in Queensland since 2016 (of 1737 with a page). Number 1021 in Australia in 2023, of 1235.

Burnt area: 5,945ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 9days; 15 Jul 2023 – 23 Jul 2023
Municipalities hit: 2; local government areas
Started on: 15 Jul; 2023
Heat detections: 302; in a single hotspot: 218 MW
Danger at start: 21; Moderate · FWI index
Energy released: 3.6GW; sum of detected power

Play back 23 Jul 2023

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 15 Jul23 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

1516181920212223

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

The weather it burned in

25°high

48km/h · peak gust

20%lowest humidity

It had gone 10 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

15% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 431 ha in 2016, 301 ha in 2020, 228 ha in 2021. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 869 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

Western Downs where it started

4,685 ha reached on 15 Jul

0.1 %
Toowoomba

1,314 ha reached on 15 Jul

0.1 %

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)
15 Jul	22.1 °C	33 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 21
16 Jul	22.7 °C	27 %	19 km/h	0.0 mm	High 22
17 Jul	21.5 °C	37 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	High 24
18 Jul	20.7 °C	48 %	20 km/h	0.3 mm	Moderate 19
19 Jul	22.2 °C	20 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	High 26
20 Jul	22.3 °C	24 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	High 25
21 Jul	22.2 °C	26 %	25 km/h	0.0 mm	High 27
22 Jul	19.1 °C	27 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	High 28
23 Jul	19.7 °C	26 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	High 25
24 Jul after	18.8 °C	37 %	48 km/h	0.3 mm	High 32
25 Jul after	21.4 °C	28 %	46 km/h	0.0 mm	High 32
26 Jul after	21.5 °C	35 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	High 27
27 Jul after	21.7 °C	29 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	High 26
28 Jul after	22.2 °C	31 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	High 25
29 Jul after	23.7 °C	24 %	18 km/h	0.0 mm	High 26
30 Jul after	25.2 °C	26 %	21 km/h	0.0 mm	High 27
31 Jul after	25.5 °C	29 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	High 29
1 Aug after	25.6 °C	13 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
2 Aug after	23.6 °C	24 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
3 Aug after	20.5 °C	48 %	46 km/h	0.1 mm	High 30
4 Aug after	22.6 °C	34 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	High 27
5 Aug after	22.2 °C	31 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	High 26
6 Aug after	22.9 °C	28 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	High 27
7 Aug after	22.2 °C	32 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	High 28
8 Aug after	21.4 °C	29 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	High 28
9 Aug after	22.2 °C	24 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	High 28

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 8 Jul 2023

After · 30 Jul 2023

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.

The smoke

CAMS · Copernicus

On 16 July 2023 the air beside the fire reached 45 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 19: 1.3 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak45 µg/m³

Days over the guideline1 day

PM1066 µg/m³

Optical depth0.36

WHO 15

1314151617181920212223242526

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 · 302Every 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 Western Downs fire last?: GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 15 July 2023 and 23 July 2023: 9 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 5,945 hectares (59.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 2 municipalities: Western Downs (4,685 ha, 0.1 %); Toowoomba (1,314 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 25.2 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 48 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 32, class 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.

Report an error

What do you think is wrong?

Dates or duration Place or towns Burned area Name It was not a wildfire Same fire as another page Something else

What really happened?

Your connection to the fire (optional) Email (optional)

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.

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