Burned area
satellite only1,098ha
Perimeter published by GWIS (Copernicus).
- Source
- GWIS (Copernicus)
- Date
- 13 Sept 2023 – 17 Sept 2023
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page to compare it with.
IQ · Iraq · –
Al-Chibayish fire, September 2023 Al-Chibayish
Out · last detection 17 Sept 2023, 22:40 UTC
The fire started on 13 September 2023 in Al-Chibayish, Iraq, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 1,098 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
Number 2 in Iraq in 2023, of 4.
Use this data
Compare with…
Use this data
Fire page data · version 2026-10-27matches the official recordwith caveatssatellite onlymodel
When copying, the sentence is
Tick the figures you want: they make up the lede and the CSV.
Duration by satellite
satellite only5days
13 Sept 2023 to 17 Sept 2023: first and last day with fire on the page.
- Source
- GWIS (Copernicus) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- last detection: 17 Sept 2023, 22:40 UTC
+− cross-check
Satellites pass a few times a day and cloud or smoke can hide the fire: a lack of detections is not an official extinction. Each country’s emergency service declares a fire contained or out.
Start
satellite only13 Sept 2023
First day with fire seen by the satellites or the perimeter.
- Source
- GWIS (Copernicus) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- 13 Sept 2023
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page, so the alert time and the cause are not known here.
Hotspots
satellite only41
VIIRS detections at 375 m. Most intense hotspot: 50 MW.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (Suomi NPP)
- Date
- 13 Sept 2023 – 17 Sept 2023
+− cross-check
There is no official record to compare with. Each hotspot is a pixel detected in one satellite pass, not a separate fire.
The worst day
satellite only902MW
Total radiative power on 15 September 2023; hotspots that day: 31.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (FRP)
- Date
- 15 Sept 2023
+− cross-check
Fire radiative power (FRP) measures the energy the fire gives off when the satellite passes. Added up by day, it compares intensity, not area.
Danger at the start
model65.3FWI · extreme
Fire Weather Index (Canadian system) computed by WorldFires for the day the fire started. Consecutive days without rain before: 60.
- Source
- WorldFires calculation (Canadian FWI system)
- Date
- 13 Sept 2023, local noon
- Model
- ERA5 0,25° (ECMWF · Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com
+− cross-check
This is an index computed from weather model data, not a measurement of the fire nor an official warning. Danger warnings are issued by each country’s authority. Emergency number and official warnings
Weather during the fire
model47.3°C · 11% RH
High of 47.3 °C and minimum humidity of 11% on 13 September 2023; gusts of 52 km/h on 15 September 2023.
- Source
- weather model at the fire’s grid cell
- Date
- 13 Sept 2023 – 17 Sept 2023
- Model
- ERA5 0,25° (ECMWF · Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com
+− cross-check
These are model values for a cell of about 25 km, not from a weather station: they may differ from what was measured on the ground.
This page’s change log has been kept since 24 October 2026: every night what it publishes is compared and the difference is logged. Anything earlier is reconstructed from each source’s date and marked as reconstructed.
Show
-
· reconstructed weatherWeather and FWI computed from the ERA5 reanalysis
-
logLast day with fire: 16 September 2023 → 17 September 2023.
-
logStart date: 15 September 2023 → 13 September 2023.
-
· reconstructed GHSLPopulation and built-up area computed
What was saved on 27 October 2026
Every night a snapshot of what the page shows is saved. If anything changes, it appears in the list as a log entry.
- Area
- 1,098 ha
- Dates
- 13 Sept 2023 – 17 Sept 2023
- Name
- Al-Chibayish
- Official record
- —
Versioned permanent link
https://worldfires.org/en/fire/al-chibayish-2023-09?v=2026-10-27A version keeps the area, dates, name and official record; the area as it was logged (changes under 2% are not logged). The map, hotspots and weather always show today’s data.
Citation
A lede of about 60 words figures only, no adjectives
CSV for this fire al-chibayish-2023-09.csv · daily, no individual hotspots
| fecha | focos_viirs | frp_mw | tmax_c | tmin_c | hr_min_pct | viento_max_kmh | racha_max_kmh | precip_mm | fwi | clase_fwi | dentro_del_incendio |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2023-09-13 | 0 | 0 | 47.3 | 31.9 | 11 | 12.6 | 25.2 | 0 | 65.3 | extremo | 1 |
| 2023-09-14 | 0 | 0 | 43.3 | 31.4 | 12 | 23 | 43.9 | 0 | 77.8 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2023-09-15 | 31 | 902 | 42.2 | 29.8 | 12 | 28.1 | 52.2 | 0 | 85.2 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2023-09-16 | 7 | 70 | 42.4 | 29.4 | 10 | 28.1 | 51.8 | 0 | 85.6 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2023-09-17 | 3 | 2 | 43.6 | 29 | 11 | 26.8 | 48.6 | 0 | 83.5 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2023-09-18 | 0 | 0 | 44 | 27 | 9 | 21.1 | 40.7 | 0 | 74.1 | muy_extremo | 0 |
| 2023-09-19 | 0 | 0 | 43.7 | 27.1 | 9 | 19.8 | 38.9 | 0 | 72.3 | muy_extremo | 0 |
| 2023-09-20 | 0 | 0 | 42.6 | 27 | 10 | 21 | 38.5 | 0 | 74.6 | muy_extremo | 0 |
| 2023-09-21 | 0 | 0 | 44.5 | 25.7 | 7 | 16.6 | 32.8 | 0 | 68 | extremo | 0 |
| 2023-09-22 | 0 | 0 | 46.1 | 27.8 | 9 | 19.1 | 37.1 | 0 | 72.1 | muy_extremo | 0 |
| 2023-09-23 | 0 | 0 | 44.8 | 29.7 | 8 | 25.5 | 47.9 | 0 | 83.2 | muy_extremo | 0 |
| 2023-09-24 | 0 | 0 | 44.6 | 26.4 | 9 | 26.2 | 46.1 | 0 | 84.8 | muy_extremo | 0 |
| 2023-09-25 | 0 | 0 | 45.7 | 27.5 | 10 | 16.6 | 24.5 | 0 | 69.1 | extremo | 0 |
| 2023-09-26 | 0 | 0 | 43.7 | 28.8 | 9 | 16.3 | 33.5 | 0 | 68.9 | extremo | 0 |
| 2023-09-27 | 0 | 0 | 43 | 28.9 | 10 | 19.2 | 35.6 | 0 | 73.1 | muy_extremo | 0 |
It is generated in your browser from this page’s data: one file per fire, aggregated by day and without individual hotspots.
Live widget for your story
It updates itself while the fire is still active and links to this page. Free, with the attribution shown at the bottom.
Sources for this page: GWIS (Copernicus), NASA FIRMS (VIIRS), ERA5 (ECMWF/Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0), GHSL (JRC). Open-Meteo.com · How we build fire pages: methodology
- Burnt area
- 1,098ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 5days
- 13 Sept 2023 – 17 Sept 2023
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- districts
- Started on
- 13 Sept
- 2023
- Heat detections
- 41
- in a single hotspot: 50 MW
- Danger at start
- 65
- Extreme · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 325MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
HOTSPOTS BY DAY
13 Sept17 Sept
17 Sept 2023
How it evolved, day by day
15 Sept
16 Sept
17 Sept
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
47°high
52km/h · peak gust
10%lowest humidity
It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
26% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 280 ha in 2016, 25 ha in 2018. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 280 ha that had burned before.
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
Berlin boundary: geoBoundaries · Federal Agency for Cartography and Geodesy (dl-de/by-2-0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
Al-Chibayish where it started1,102 ha reached on 15 Sept0.5 %
Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.
People and buildings inside the perimeter
GHSL 2025Built-up area< 0.1 ha
Residents< 20
Inside the perimeter there was no noticeable built-up land and almost nobody lived there (GHSL 2025, satellite-based estimate).
This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned. The GHSL 2025 epoch is a projection made from 2020 and earlier data.
Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu
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)
Started with Very dry air: 69 % of the area in Iraq 60 days without rain: 27 % of the area in Iraq
| Day | High | Min. humidity | Peak gust | Rain | Danger (FWI) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 13 Sept | 47.3 °C | 11 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 65 |
| 14 Sept | 43.3 °C | 12 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 78 |
| 15 Sept | 42.2 °C | 12 % | 52 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 85 |
| 16 Sept | 42.4 °C | 10 % | 52 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 86 |
| 17 Sept | 43.6 °C | 11 % | 49 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 84 |
| 18 Sept after | 44.0 °C | 9 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 74 |
| 19 Sept after | 43.7 °C | 9 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 72 |
| 20 Sept after | 42.6 °C | 10 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 75 |
| 21 Sept after | 44.5 °C | 7 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 68 |
| 22 Sept after | 46.1 °C | 9 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 72 |
| 23 Sept after | 44.8 °C | 8 % | 48 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 83 |
| 24 Sept after | 44.6 °C | 9 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 85 |
| 25 Sept after | 45.7 °C | 10 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 69 |
| 26 Sept after | 43.7 °C | 9 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 69 |
| 27 Sept after | 43.0 °C | 10 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 73 |
Its twins: fires that started in the same weather
It started with an FWI of 65.3, a minimum humidity of 11% and more than two months without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2016: 12.
FWI at the start
65.3
Minimum humidity
11 %
Days without rain
60+
this fire
chosen twins
rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar
Outlines of the closest twins
This fire · Al-Chibayish fire, September 2023
1,098 ha
5 days
FWI 65.3
Min. humidity 11 %
Suq Al-Shoyokh fire, September 2018
1,295 ha
13 days
FWI 68.0
Min. humidity 12 %
18 km away, in 2018
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
Al-Mejar Al-Kabir fire, September 2018
1,054 ha
43 days
FWI 67.3
Min. humidity 9 %
116 km away, in 2018
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 1.7 mm on 21 Oct.
Al-Kahla fire, September 2018
5,576 ha
33 days
FWI 67.3
Min. humidity 9 %
129 km away, in 2018
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 1.0 mm on 14 Oct.
Al-Kahla fire, August 2025
1,935 ha
17 days
FWI 70.9
Min. humidity 13 %
110 km away, in 2025
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
Al-Manathera fire, May 2021
1,086 ha
11 days
FWI 64.4
Min. humidity 7 %
231 km away, in 2021
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
What happened to them
Fires in the area that started in similar weather: 12. With fewer than 15 we give no figures: they would be more noise than signal.
This is a bank of analogues: it shows what usually happens, not what will happen. With fewer than 15 twins we give no figures. How we calculate it
How it ended
—first rain
—no rain in ten days
52km/h · max. gust
It was considered over on 17 Sept, and not even 1 mm fell in the following ten days: it went out without rain.
Weather on this page: Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)
How a twin is chosen
- Same area: fires that have already ended, less than 250 km from this one, since 2016.
- Same start: we compare the FWI on the first day, the minimum humidity that day and the run of days without rain before it. The slider sets how much they may differ.
- Only pages with final weather data (ERA5 reanalysis) calculated in the same way as this fire’s; agricultural and grass burns and pages with data under review are left out.
- Fires burning at the same time as this one (a week before or after) are left out: they share the same spell of weather and do not count as a precedent.
- They are sorted by similarity, and the outlines of the first five are drawn.
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
↔
Before · 6 Sept 2023
After · 24 Sept 2023
Sentinel-2 did not pass over on that day. Try another date, or use false colour, which is daily.
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 · CopernicusOn 14 September 2023 the air beside the fire reached 132 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 57: 3.8 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
PM2.5 peak132 µg/m³
Days over the guideline7 days
PM10604 µg/m³
Optical depth0.75
WHO 15
13 Sept15 Sept17 Sept19 Sept
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 · 41Every 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
- 1,077 haSuq Al-ShoyokhJanuary 2016 · 8 days · 3 km away
- 1,371 haSuq Al-Shoyokh1 September 2018 · 2 days · 4 km away
- 1,253 haAl-Chibayish10 August 2022 · 1 day · 8 km away
- 1,085 haAl-Chibayish9 August 2022 · 4 days · 12 km away
- 1,369 haAl-ChibayishMarch 2022 · 1 day · 13 km away
- 1,295 haSuq Al-Shoyokh23 September 2018 · 13 days · 18 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Al-Chibayish fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 13 September 2023 to 17 September 2023 (5 days). The perimeter dates it from 15 September 2023 to 16 September 2023.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 1,098 hectares (11.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Al-Chibayish (1,102 ha, 0.5 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 47.3 °C, humidity dropped to 10 % and gusts hit 52 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 86, class Very extreme.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Iraq (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.
Satellite cross-check
History of this page · 2 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
- Last day with fire: 16 September 2023 → 17 September 2023.
- Start date: 15 September 2023 → 13 September 2023.
RSS Changes to this page With cross-checks and a citable version
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
How we know this
- Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery.
- Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 15 September 2023 to 16 September 2023. 41 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
- We have not matched this page with any official record.
- Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
- Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2025, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.
Where this data comes from
The perimeter comes from the Copernicus Global Wildfire Information System (GWIS), which rebuilds it from MODIS and VIIRS heat detections and publishes it under CC BY 4.0. It is not measured on imagery as in Europe, so it is an estimate. 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 ADM2 (Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY 3.0 IGO)). The area per municipality is computed by WorldFires by crossing the perimeter with those boundaries, so it may differ from each country’s official figure.