Rose Hill Bay Fire, North Carolina (2026)

This fire in numbersDay 83

215Hectares531Acres83Days burning

Containment100%

Started on Jul 8, 2026.

United States todayLive

75Active540Hotspots 48h1.0 MHectares

Last 7 days · steady

All United States wildfires

Rose Hill Bay Fire (North Carolina) — Sentinel-2 true color

Rose Hill Bay Fire (North Carolina) — Sentinel-2 SWIR (fuego)

True view Fire view

⟷

True view (left): as the eye sees it.
Fire view (right): infrared (SWIR), sees through smoke and brings out the heat.

🟢 green = vegetation
🟤 brown = already burned
🟠 orange = fire right now

Drag to compare: normal photo on the left, heat brought out on the right.

Green: vegetationBrown: already burnedOrange: fire right nowSentinel-2 · Copernicus

Red dots: heat detected by satellite in the last 48h. NASA FIRMS

Quick facts

Location: 2 miles southwest of Rose Hill, NC
People working on it: 1 people
Complexity: Type 5 IncidentOfficial scale from 5 to 1: a Type 1 is the most complex in the country.
What's burning: Closed Timber Litter
How it's behaving: Minimal, Single Tree TorchingCreeping — Moves slowly, hugging the ground.
Jurisdiction: Private land

Glossary: what each term means

Minimal

Barely moving. Low, thin smoke.

Smoldering

Burning without flame, in the ground or in roots. Can flare up days later.

Creeping

Moves slowly, hugging the ground.

Moderate

Spreads with low, steady flames.

Active

Spreading evenly and steadily, with visible flame.

Extreme

Fast and unpredictable.

Running

Runs along the ground much faster than a person walks.

Flanking

Grows along the sides, not head-on.

Backing

Moves against the wind or downhill, which makes it slower.

Crowning

Climbs into the treetops and jumps crown to crown. It can't be attacked from the ground.

Short Crown Runs

Climbs into the crowns in bursts and drops back down.

Torching

Whole trees flaring up like torches.

Isolated Torching

Single scattered trees flaring up whole, like torches.

Group Torching

Whole clumps of trees flaring at once.

Spotting

Wind carries embers through the air and starts new fires ahead of the front: that is how a fire jumps a road or a firebreak.

Wind Driven Runs

The wind pushes it in long runs in one direction.

The ones marked ● are the behaviors that make a fire harder to stop. They are not a warning or an instruction: they are the description written by the agency in charge. For decisions, always follow your emergency services.

Burning across 531 acres of private land in Duplin County, the Rose Hill Bay Fire has spent 37 days on the landscape since starting on July 8, 2026, maintaining an average daily growth of approximately 14 acres per day. Located two miles southwest of Rose Hill, North Carolina, the Type 5 Incident is currently fully contained at 100 percent.

Fire behavior is reported as minimal, characterized by creeping and single tree torching within closed timber litter fuels. The incident is managed by a Type 5 Incident Commander overseeing a minimal crew of one personnel, with total suppression costs reaching $119,600.

This fire occurs during the region's typical fire season, which runs from June to October. Nationally, the broader context shows 2,902,022 hectares burned so far in 2026, marking a figure that is 47 percent below the two-decade average.

In context

This wildfire has been burning in North Carolina for 82 days. So far it has affected roughly 531 acres — about 2.1 km². The perimeter is 100% contained.

In the Northern Hemisphere, wildfire activity usually peaks during the warm, dry months — roughly May through October.