[NASA] Fighting Fire With Fire

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3. Fighting Fire With Fire

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• Topics
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• More Content
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• About
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Smoke streams from fires in Australia’s Northern Territory in an image captured by the

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(Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer) on NASA’s

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satellite on May 28, 2026.

NASA Earth Observatory/Michala Garrison

In May and June of most years,

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typically begin to detect large numbers of wildland fires throughout the Top End and Arnhem Land regions of Australia’s Northern Territory. On some days, especially in the afternoon, the blazes can resemble sizable wildfires in satellite imagery, spreading widely and producing expansive smoke plumes.

That was the case when NASA’s

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satellite acquired this image of smoke and fires on the afternoon of

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. Often, however, fires burning in this area look smaller and less imposing. In the mornings just a

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and

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, for instance, NASA satellites detected little smoke despite observing many

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, or hotspots, that indicated fire activity.

The pattern of burning, location, and timing are consistent with

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lit intentionally to manage the landscape. Land managers tend to light fires in the morning, and smoke builds over the course of the day. The process sometimes creates sizable plumes when there are updrafts and winds of moderate strength that carry smoke away from the fires, as happened on May 28 and again on

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. The fires typically burn through the fire-adapted grasses, underbrush, and scattered trees in the region’s

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.

Over the past few decades, the region’s land managers have combined deep-rooted Indigenous land management practices and modern technologies to establish large-scale landscape management programs such as the

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project and

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. The goal of such efforts is to intentionally burn some of the savanna underbrush to create firebreaks and reduce fuel loads early in the dry season, reducing more destructive and emissions-intensive fires later in the season. The dry season generally begins in May and extends through September, according to

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.

While research is ongoing, there are signs that the prescribed burning efforts are having the intended effect. Analysis of satellite observations of the fires suggests that prescribed burning efforts have

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from late to early in the dry season, leading to a

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in high-intensity fires and emissions.

NASA Earth Observatory image by Michala Garrison, using MODIS data from NASA 

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 and 

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. Story by Adam Voiland.

Downloads

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May 28, 2026

JPEG (1.82 MB)

References & Resources

• Ansell, J., et al. (2020)
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  . International Journal of Wildland Fire, 29(5), 371–385.
• Arnhem Land Fire Abatement (2026)
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  . Accessed June 4, 2026.
• Carbon Market Institute (2026)
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  . Accessed June 4, 2026.
• Edwards, A., et al. (2021)
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  . Journal of Environmental Management, 290, 112568.
• Evans, J. & Russell-Smith, J. (2020)
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  . International Journal of Wildland Fire, 29(5), 386-400.
• NASA Earthdata,
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  . Accessed June 4, 2026.
• NASA Fire Information for Resource Management System (2026, May 28)
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  . Accessed June 4, 2026.
• Russell-Smith, J., et al. (2026)
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  . International Journal of Wildland Fire, 35(4), 26039.

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