Fire Weather Watch — Pointe Coupee; West Feliciana; East Feliciana; St. Helena; Washington; Iberville; West Baton Rouge; East Baton Rouge; As was recorded by Global Incident Tracker on Friday, 16 October 2026 at 05:21 UTC. The event is classified as a wildfire incident with a severity rating of Severe, and was detected through the US National Weather Service (NWS).
Fire Weather Watch issued October 16 at 12:21AM CDT until October 17 at 8:00PM CDT by NWS New Orleans LA ...CRITICAL FIRE WEATHER CONDITIONS POSSIBLE SATURDAY... .A cold front will move through the area later today bringing very dry air with RH values falling into the low to mid 30s along with windy conditions with some gusts around 30 mph. The combination of gusty winds, current drought conditions, ample dry fuel, and very dry conditions will allow any fire that develops to spread quickly. * AFFECTED AREA...Pointe Coupee, West Feliciana, East Feliciana, St. Helena, Washington, Iberville, West Baton Rouge, East Baton Rouge, Assumption, St. James, Wilkinson, Amite, Pike, Northern Tangipahoa, Walthall, Southeast St. Tammany, Northern St. Tammany, Southwestern St. Tammany, Central Tangipahoa, Lower Tangipahoa, Northern Livingston, Southern Livingston, Western Ascension and Eastern Ascensi
Where this happened
The incident is located in United States (North America), whose capital is Washington, D.C.. Historically, United States is most affected by hurricanes, wildfires, tornadoes, earthquakes and floods. You can follow every incident recorded in this country, updated live, on the United States incident tracker.
Approximate coordinates of the reported event are 37.100°, -95.700°. The marker on the map above shows this position; for news-derived reports the location reflects the place named in media coverage and may represent a district or city rather than an exact site.
Understanding wildfire events
Uncontrolled vegetation fires in forest, bush, grass or peat. Wildfire behaviour is driven by three things: fuel (dry vegetation), weather (heat, low humidity, wind) and terrain. Wind shifts are what most often turn a controlled perimeter into an emergency, which is why evacuation orders can change very quickly.
How severity is rated
Global Incident Tracker rates every event on a four-step scale — Minor, Moderate, Severe and Extreme — derived from the source signal: earthquake magnitude, official GDACS alert colour, or the volume of independent media reporting for news-derived incidents. This event is currently rated Severe. Ratings can change as more information becomes available, and a rating is a monitoring signal rather than an official government assessment.
Safety guidance for wildfire situations
- Leave early if advised — late evacuation on smoke-filled roads is the most dangerous option.
- Close windows and vents, remove flammable items from around the building and wet down the perimeter if time allows.
- Wear cotton, long sleeves and an N95-type mask; smoke harms lungs long before flames arrive.
- Keep a packed bag, full fuel tank and two separate escape routes planned.
- Follow only official instructions from local authorities and emergency services — this page is a monitoring record, not an emergency alert.
Data and verification
This record was generated automatically from the US National Weather Service (NWS) and de-duplicated against our archive. Early reports for any incident can be revised: locations get refined, magnitudes are recalculated and impact figures change as assessments arrive. We deliberately do not publish casualty numbers unless an official source states them. The original source report is linked at the top of this page.
Keep watching the situation on our live world incident map, browse every wildfires we track on the Wildfire tracker, or see today's global picture on the incidents today page.
Timeline and sources
Official warning
Issued by U.S. National Weather Service. A warning or forecast describes a hazard; on its own it is not a report that harm occurred.
How statuses are decided · the number of reports is never treated as confirmation.
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· received · event time 16 Oct 2026, 05:21 UTCFirst report Official warning
First recorded from U.S. National Weather Service.
Times are when this site received each report, in UTC; the event time is shown where the source gave one. Copies of one syndicated story count as one report.
Conditions at the time
No rainfall was recorded that day, and the temperature peaked at 16°C, and winds reached 39 km/h. Conditions are shown for context only — they do not establish a cause.
Weather reanalysis for this location and date via Open-Meteo.