Australia is developing a more intelligent way to manage bushfires by combining satellite monitoring, artificial intelligence, drones and advanced fire modelling with the place-based knowledge of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities.
Modern technology can reveal where fires are burning, predict how quickly they may spread and monitor vegetation across enormous areas. Indigenous cultural fire knowledge provides something technology cannot generate on its own: a deep understanding of how particular landscapes, plants, animals, seasons and weather conditions respond to fire.
The approach is not about replacing firefighting aircraft or emergency crews with traditional practices. It brings different systems together so that land can be managed before a catastrophic fire begins, while emergency agencies receive better information when one does.
Cultural Burning Treats Fire as a Management Tool
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples have used carefully planned fire to care for Country for thousands of years. These practices are commonly described as cultural burning, although their methods, purposes and names differ between communities.
Cultural burns are generally cooler, slower and more targeted than uncontrolled bushfires. Traditional Custodians may burn particular vegetation at carefully selected times to reduce accumulated fuel, protect tree canopies, support plant regeneration, create habitat mosaics and maintain culturally significant places.
Australia’s State of the Environment report on caring for Country explains that traditional fire management is highly specific to each community and landscape. The correct season, intensity and location depend on local knowledge rather than a single national formula.
That distinction is important. Cultural burning should not be reduced to another term for conventional hazard-reduction burning. Large prescribed burns are often designed mainly to lower fuel levels across a predetermined area. Cultural fire may also reduce danger, but it can have broader ecological, spiritual and community objectives.
The CSIRO’s comparison of cultural and hazard-reduction burning notes that cultural burns are commonly smaller and carefully tailored to protect selected parts of an ecosystem. They may be used to control invasive plants, encourage desired species, open pathways or support cultural practices as well as reduce fuel.
Satellites Provide a National View of Fire Activity
Indigenous fire practitioners read local signs on Country, while satellite systems provide a much wider view of conditions across the continent.
Geoscience Australia operates Digital Earth Australia Hotspots, a national monitoring system that identifies areas producing unusually high levels of infrared radiation. These hotspots can indicate active fires and help emergency managers understand where potential threats are developing.
The official Digital Earth Australia Hotspots platform receives updated information approximately every 10 minutes. Its map also indicates how recently a hotspot was detected and the system’s confidence that the observation represents a genuine high-temperature event.
Satellite imagery can also show how much land has burned, where vegetation remains dry and how fire has changed a landscape. A newer Geoscience Australia dataset uses Sentinel-2 imagery to measure vegetation moisture at a spatial resolution of 20 metres and is updated weekly. Moisture information can help agencies identify vegetation that may be more likely to ignite or support intense fire.
These tools do not replace people on the ground. Cloud, smoke, satellite timing and image resolution can limit what remote sensors detect. However, satellite data helps authorities prioritise inspections, allocate resources and understand fires occurring in areas that are difficult to reach.
Artificial Intelligence Predicts Where Fire May Travel
Detecting a fire answers only the first question. Emergency agencies must also estimate where it could move, how quickly it may intensify and which communities or ecological areas may be threatened.
CSIRO developed Spark, an open fire-prediction framework that combines fire-behaviour knowledge with simulation technology. It can process information about weather, terrain, vegetation and ignition points to produce estimates and visualisations of fire spread.
The CSIRO Spark platform is designed to support analysis before and during an emergency. Instead of relying on a static map, fire managers can examine how changing wind, fuel and environmental conditions may alter the direction or intensity of a fire.
CSIRO and the Australian and New Zealand National Council for Fire and Emergency Services have also been advancing the use of artificial intelligence and satellite technology in national bushfire preparedness. Research infrastructure is being made available to support further development of AI-based prediction and decision-support systems.
AI can process enormous datasets more quickly than a human team, but it cannot independently decide how fire should be used on a culturally and ecologically complex landscape. Its predictions depend on the accuracy of its weather, vegetation and fuel information. Local knowledge remains essential for interpreting what the model may miss.
Drones Help Indigenous Rangers Protect Wildlife
One of the clearest examples of the combined approach can be found on Minjerribah, also known as North Stradbroke Island, in Queensland.
Quandamooka Indigenous rangers are using cultural burning to reduce dangerous vegetation while deploying thermal-imaging drones and artificial intelligence to locate koalas before burns take place. The island’s naturally occurring koala population is genetically distinct and has faced increasing danger from severe fires.
A project led by the Quandamooka Yoolooburrabee Aboriginal Corporation uses drone surveys to map koala locations before cultural fire is introduced. Rangers can then protect occupied trees, adjust the burn area and place additional firefighting resources nearby.
According to WWF-Australia’s report on the project, drones can survey as much as 50 hectares per hour. One two-night drone operation located 52 koalas in Flinders Swamp, while a ground survey in a nearby area found only one.
The technology strengthens rather than replaces ranger knowledge. Traditional Owners already understand animal behaviour, vegetation and seasonal changes. Thermal cameras increase visibility through dense vegetation, while AI is being trained to help distinguish koalas from other heat sources.
This combination allows the burn to remain culturally informed while reducing the possibility that protected wildlife will be placed at unnecessary risk.
Northern Fire Management Is Reducing Late-Season Wildfires
Indigenous-led fire management is also operating at a much larger scale across northern Australia’s savannas.
Early dry-season burns can create a patchwork of areas with different fire histories. When late-season wildfires begin under hotter, drier and windier conditions, previously burned patches may interrupt their movement and reduce the amount of fuel available.
The Australian Government’s northern savanna fire-management programme combines traditional knowledge with contemporary mapping, emissions measurement and carbon-accounting systems. Projects can earn Australian Carbon Credit Units by reducing the frequency and extent of destructive late dry-season fires.
Satellite mapping helps ranger groups document when and where fires occurred. Carbon methodologies then calculate the avoided emissions compared with historical fire patterns. Revenue can support ranger employment, equipment, training and additional care for Country.
The model demonstrates that cultural fire can provide environmental, economic and community benefits when Traditional Owners maintain a leading role.
Technology Works Best When Indigenous Leadership Comes First
The growing interest in cultural burning has also created a risk that organisations will extract selected techniques without respecting the authority, intellectual property or decision-making rights of the communities that hold the knowledge.
A government agency cannot simply copy one group’s burning calendar and apply it somewhere else. Australian landscapes vary enormously, and cultural knowledge belongs to specific peoples and Country.
Meaningful collaboration therefore requires Indigenous leadership from planning through implementation and evaluation. Technology providers and emergency agencies can contribute data, equipment and scientific expertise, but Traditional Custodians must have genuine authority over how cultural knowledge is shared and applied.
Australia’s environmental reporting identifies legal restrictions, limited access to Country, liability concerns and inadequate funding as continuing barriers. Cultural burning remains underused and has reportedly been applied across less than one percent of the land area in the south-eastern states and territory.
Expanding the approach will require more than purchasing drones or adding Indigenous terminology to existing fire plans. It will require long-term ranger employment, intergenerational knowledge transfer, access to land and formal partnerships that recognise First Nations governance.
Australia’s Strongest Defence Begins Before the Fire
Aircraft, fire trucks and emergency alerts remain essential once a dangerous bushfire begins. However, firefighting becomes increasingly difficult when extreme heat, strong wind and heavy fuel create conditions in which a fire cannot be safely controlled.
Australia’s emerging strategy therefore begins much earlier. Cultural burning can improve the condition of Country and create more varied fuel patterns. Satellites can reveal heat and vegetation stress across vast areas. AI can model possible fire behaviour, while drones provide detailed information in places that are difficult or dangerous to inspect from the ground.
None of these systems is sufficient by itself. Technology can observe and calculate, but it does not possess the cultural relationships or local ecological understanding developed through generations of caring for Country. Indigenous knowledge can guide healthier fire regimes, while modern tools can expand monitoring, documentation and operational reach.
Australia’s most promising bushfire innovation may therefore be neither entirely new nor entirely ancient. It is a partnership in which advanced technology supports the people who already understand how to work with fire, rather than waiting until fire becomes an enemy that can no longer be controlled.
