Kawaihea Road Fire (Hawaii)
True color
Fire (SWIR)
Infrared / SWIR (right): sees through smoke.
🟢 green = vegetation
🟤 red/brown = burned
🟠 orange = active fire
Imagery: Sentinel-2 (Copernicus). Drag to compare smoke vs. infrared.
Heat detections: NASA FIRMS (last 48h).
Quick facts
- Location
- 2 Miles SE from Kawaihae Village, HI
- Personnel
- 5
- Complexity
- Type 3 Incident
- Fuel
- Short Grass (1 foot)
- Behavior
- Minimal, Flanking, Creeping
- Jurisdiction
- Private land
Burning for 40 days, the Kawaihea Road Fire near Kamuela, Hawaii has maintained an approximate average daily growth of 13 acres per day across a total footprint of 500 acres. Located two miles southeast of Kawaihae Village in Hawaii County, the incident is currently 100 percent contained and exhibiting minimal, flanking, and creeping fire behavior within short grass fuels standing about one foot tall.
Operations on the private landholding are supported by five personnel under a Type 3 Incident structure managed by a Type 3 Incident Commander, with suppression costs reaching 233,361 dollars. The local fire season typically runs from June to October. Nationally, the broader context shows that 3,177,542 hectares have burned so far in 2026, marking a figure that is 42 percent below the two-decade average.
In context
This wildfire has been burning in Hawaii for 41 days. So far it has affected roughly 500 acres — about 2.0 km². The perimeter is 100% contained.
Close to the tropics, fires tend to follow the dry season and are often linked to land-clearing rather than a single summer peak.
The bigger picture in United States
Across United States, roughly 3,178,795 hectares have burned so far in 2026 — 42% below the two-decade average. Data from Copernicus GWIS.
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