On May 10, 2007, a large human-caused fire broke out near the island’s only city, Avalon. Before it was contained five days later, the fire scorched 4,800 acres.
A large fire was burning on Melville Island north of mainland Australia on October 4, 2006, when the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Aqua satellite passed overhead.