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Wildfire watch
Where fires are burning across the UK, spotted from satellites and refreshed through the day — how big each one is, and which way the smoke is heading. It's an early satellite picture, not an official record; call 999 if you can see a fire in the open. Member wildfire terrain reels →
Right now
Roughly 61 km² of the UK is showing active fire.
10 large fires and 86 smaller ones across 6 areas — about 8,700 football pitches.
8.5 km² · smoke drifting south-east
Details →9.1 km² · smoke drifting east
Details →12.3 km² · smoke drifting north
Details →1.5 km² · smoke drifting south-east
Details →0.7 km² · smoke drifting north
Details →1.3 km² · smoke drifting south-east
Details →0.7 km² · smoke drifting south-east
Details →0.7 km² · smoke drifting north-west
Details →1.1 km² · smoke drifting north-east
Details →1.8 km² · smoke drifting north-west
Details →+ 74 more smaller fires being tracked
Found automatically by Arcus, our wildfire tracker, from NASA satellite heat detections. Sizes are the area giving off heat right now — an estimate, not the total ground burnt — and smoke direction is a short-range forecast. This is a satellite's-eye view, not confirmed by the fire service. Tap a fire for detail.
Highest risk Today — very high.
Very high — dangerous fire-weather. Avoid any naked flame in the countryside.
We run three separate weather models (the Met Office UKV, the European ECMWF, and Germany's ICON). When they agree we can be more confident; a flag marks the days they don't.
Southern UK
500
heat spots detected
Scotland
8
heat spots detected
UK total
500
heat spots detected
Map of heat detections
Each dot is a spot of heat a satellite picked up. Southern UK sits below the dashed line.
Individual heat spots · 500
How this works
NASA weather satellites pass over the UK several times a day and pick up spots of intense heat. We group those into fires and estimate the size of each.
What the sizes mean
Sizes are the area actively giving off heat, measured from space — a rough estimate for scale, not a surveyed burnt area.
What it can miss
Cloud hides fires, and small or smouldering ones often don't show at all. Factories and glare off greenhouses can look like faint fires — show those too.
Staying safe
How UK wildfires start
Nearly all are started by people, and nearly all are preventable — disposable barbecues, campfires, dropped cigarettes, sky lanterns, sparks from machinery, land burns that get away, sometimes broken glass focusing the sun.
Dry moorland, heath, gorse, forest floor and long grass burn fastest — in spring before things green up, and in a dry summer spell after a run of warm, breezy days.
Prevent one
If a fire is near you
Smoke & your health
Wildfire smoke stings eyes and throats and makes breathing harder. If it's drifting your way, close windows and doors, bring washing and pets in, and take it easy outdoors.
People with asthma or other lung or heart conditions, and the very young or elderly, feel it most — keep any inhaler handy and call NHS 111 if breathing gets worse. Check the air-quality index in a smoke event.
Reporting a fire
See a fire burning in the open? Call 999and ask for the Fire service — don't assume someone else has. Give the best location you can (what3words, a grid reference, or a nearby landmark), roughly how big it is, and what's burning. Fuller advice on our heatwaves & wildfire page.