How long did the Ain Ben Beida fire last?

Copernicus dates it between 20 August 2026 and 20 August 2026: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.

How much area did it burn?

The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 217 hectares (2.2 km²). Official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire only entered Ain Ben Beida (218 ha, 1.6 %).

Did the fire reach a town?

The closest fire to a town centre came within 0.8 km of Ain Ben Beida. That is the distance to the perimeter or nearest hotspot; it does not mean it entered the houses.

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 37.0 °C, humidity dropped to 22 % and gusts hit 55 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 50, class Extreme.

Where does this data come from?

From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Algeria (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

DZ · Algeria · 2026-08-20 → 2026-08-20

Ain Ben Beida fire, August 2026 عين بن بيضاء · Ain Ben Beida

Out · last detection 20 Aug 2026, 13:25 UTC

The fire started on 20 August 2026 in Ain Ben Beida, Algeria, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 217 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 31th largest in Annaba since 2016 (of 50 with a page). Number 131 in Algeria in 2026, of 197.

The power measured by the satellite is low (25.3 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.

Burnt area: 217ha; Copernicus perimeter
Duration: 1day; 20 Aug 2026 – 20 Aug 2026
Municipalities hit: 1; communes
Started on: 20 Aug; 2026
Heat detections: 15; in a single hotspot: 25 MW
Danger at start: 50; Extreme · FWI index
Energy released: 7MW; sum of detected power

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 20 Aug20 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.

The weather it burned in

37°high

55km/h · peak gust

22%lowest humidity

It had gone 4 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

Ain Ben Beida عين بن بيضاء 9,492 inhabitants · 0.8 km from the town where it started

218 ha reached on 20 Aug

1.6 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the official perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance is from the town centre to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.

What burned

Other natural land37 %
Agricultural areas32 %
Mixed forest31 %

Land cover inside the perimeter as reported by Copernicus EFFIS (outside the Corine Land Cover area).

The weather day by day

ECMWF ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, the standard reference for past weather, and the Canadian Fire Weather Index (the same system Copernicus uses), computed by WorldFires from that data. Days after the fire run until the first rain.

Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)

Day	High	Min. humidity	Peak gust	Danger (FWI)
20 Aug	37.0 °C	22 %	55 km/h	Extreme 50
21 Aug after	35.1 °C	39 %	41 km/h	Very high 40
22 Aug after	33.9 °C	55 %	38 km/h	High 28
23 Aug after	38.0 °C	32 %	54 km/h	High 36
24 Aug after	38.8 °C	30 %	31 km/h	High 35
25 Aug after	33.8 °C	56 %	31 km/h	High 24
26 Aug after	45.5 °C	9 %	54 km/h	Very extreme 75
27 Aug after	46.3 °C	7 %	54 km/h	Very extreme 80
28 Aug after	34.7 °C	26 %	34 km/h	Very high 45
29 Aug after	44.0 °C	9 %	50 km/h	Extreme 67
30 Aug after	34.0 °C	51 %	29 km/h	High 30

Before and after, from space

Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.

↔

Before · 13 Aug 2026

After · 27 Aug 2026

Before After

If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.

The smoke

CAMS · Copernicus

On 18 August 2026 the air beside the fire reached 20 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 15: 1.0 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak20 µg/m³

Days over the guideline1 day

PM1041 µg/m³

Optical depth0.63

WHO 15

181920212223

Good Fair Moderate Poor Very poor Extremely poor

Particles from the Copernicus CAMS model at the centre of the perimeter; these are not measurements in each town. The pale bar is the worst hour, the solid one the daily average.

Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS)

Detections table · 15Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.

⬇ Download CSV Times in UTC. Each detection is a 375 m pixel: a large fire yields hundreds per pass.

Date and time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Algeria ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Ain Ben Beida fire last?: Copernicus dates it between 20 August 2026 and 20 August 2026: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?: The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 217 hectares (2.2 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire only entered Ain Ben Beida (218 ha, 1.6 %).
Did the fire reach a town?: The closest fire to a town centre came within 0.8 km of Ain Ben Beida. That is the distance to the perimeter or nearest hotspot; it does not mean it entered the houses.
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 37.0 °C, humidity dropped to 22 % and gusts hit 55 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 50, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?: From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Algeria (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

Where to verify it

A satellite detection is not an official report. Final figures and the fire’s status are published by each country’s emergency service.

Emergency number: 14 · 1021

Satellite cross-check

NASA FIRMS ↗
EFFIS · Copernicus ↗

Does something look wrong on this page?

This page is built from satellite data and official records, and it sometimes gets things wrong: the wrong dates, the wrong town, two fires merged into one, or something that was not a wildfire at all. If you know this fire first-hand (you live nearby, saw it, fought it or reported on it), tell us what really happened and we will check it.

Report an error

What do you think is wrong?

Dates or duration Place or towns Burned area Name It was not a wildfire Same fire as another page Something else

What really happened?

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We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy. This is not an emergency service: if there is a fire now, call 14 · 1021.

Where this data comes from

The perimeter and land cover come from the Copernicus European Forest Fire Information System (EFFIS), measured on MODIS and Sentinel-2 imagery and published under CC BY 4.0. Heat detections come from the VIIRS sensors aboard Suomi-NPP and NOAA-20, distributed by NASA FIRMS at 375 m resolution. Municipal boundaries come from geoBoundaries ADM3 (Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0). The area per municipality is computed by WorldFires by crossing the perimeter with those boundaries, so it may differ slightly from each country’s official figure.

Where it burned