Burned area
satellite only8,615ha
Union of 3 GWIS (Copernicus) perimeters: overlapping areas count once.
- Source
- GWIS (Copernicus)
- Date
- 29 May 2022 – 2 Jul 2022
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page to compare it with.
IQ · Iraq · –
Al-Kahla fire, May 2022 Al-Kahla
Out · last detection 25 Jun 2022, 08:54 UTC
The fire started on 29 May 2022 in Al-Kahla, Iraq, and satellites saw it burning for 35 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 8,615 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 2th largest in Maysan since 2016 (of 29 with a page). The largest in Iraq in 2022, of 12.
Use this data
Compare with…
Use this data
Fire page data · version 2026-11-05matches 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 only35days
29 May 2022 to 2 Jul 2022: first and last day with fire on the page.
- Source
- GWIS (Copernicus) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- last detection: 25 Jun 2022, 08:54 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 only29 May 2022
First day with fire seen by the satellites or the perimeter.
- Source
- GWIS (Copernicus) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- 29 May 2022
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page, so the alert time and the cause are not known here.
Hotspots
satellite only181
VIIRS detections at 375 m. Most intense hotspot: 153 MW.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (Suomi NPP)
- Date
- 29 May 2022 – 2 Jul 2022
+− 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 only2,124MW
Total radiative power on 14 June 2022; hotspots that day: 46.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (FRP)
- Date
- 14 Jun 2022
+− 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
model68.2FWI · extreme
Fire Weather Index (Canadian system) computed by WorldFires for the day the fire started. Consecutive days without rain before: 28.
- Source
- WorldFires calculation (Canadian FWI system)
- Date
- 29 May 2022, 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
model50.2°C · 6% RH
High of 50.2 °C and minimum humidity of 6% on 7 June 2022; gusts of 70 km/h on 2 July 2022.
- Source
- weather model at the fire’s grid cell
- Date
- 29 May 2022 – 2 Jul 2022
- 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
-
logArea: 9,182 → 8,615 ha.
-
· reconstructed weatherWeather and FWI computed from the ERA5 reanalysis
-
· reconstructed GHSLPopulation and built-up area computed
What was saved on 5 November 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
- 8,615 ha
- Dates
- 29 May 2022 – 2 Jul 2022
- Name
- Al-Kahla
- Official record
- —
Versioned permanent link
https://worldfires.org/en/fire/al-kahla-2022-05?v=2026-11-05A 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-kahla-2022-05.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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2022-05-29 | 0 | 0 | 42.7 | 23.4 | 7 | 18.9 | 30.2 | 0 | 68.2 | extremo | 1 |
| 2022-05-30 | 0 | 0 | 44.5 | 28.1 | 8 | 22.2 | 32.8 | 0 | 73.8 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2022-05-31 | 1 | 20 | 45.7 | 29 | 8 | 16.7 | 26.3 | 0 | 66.4 | extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-01 | 0 | 0 | 46.4 | 28.5 | 7 | 13.5 | 27.7 | 0 | 63.4 | extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-02 | 0 | 0 | 46.9 | 27.1 | 7 | 13.9 | 27 | 0 | 64.4 | extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-03 | 0 | 0 | 48.1 | 27.9 | 6 | 10.6 | 18.4 | 0 | 61.7 | extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-04 | 0 | 0 | 48.7 | 30.3 | 7 | 12.4 | 25.6 | 0 | 64.5 | extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-05 | 0 | 0 | 49.3 | 31.2 | 6 | 15.5 | 25.6 | 0 | 69.9 | extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-06 | 0 | 0 | 49.2 | 32.7 | 8 | 13.3 | 27 | 0 | 66.9 | extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-07 | 0 | 0 | 50.2 | 32.5 | 6 | 12 | 24.8 | 0 | 65.5 | extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-08 | 0 | 0 | 49.4 | 30.1 | 8 | 17.8 | 25.2 | 0 | 74.7 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-09 | 0 | 0 | 48.2 | 32.4 | 8 | 27.3 | 42.8 | 0 | 92 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-10 | 0 | 0 | 45 | 31.7 | 5 | 35.8 | 59 | 0 | 110.5 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-11 | 0 | 0 | 44.5 | 29.2 | 8 | 36.2 | 58.7 | 0 | 110.3 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-12 | 9 | 234 | 45.5 | 30.2 | 9 | 30.9 | 49.7 | 0 | 98.5 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-13 | 0 | 0 | 46.2 | 28 | 9 | 17.4 | 33.8 | 0 | 74 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-14 | 46 | 2,124 | 45.5 | 31.7 | 9 | 23.6 | 42.8 | 0 | 84.3 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-15 | 20 | 441 | 45.8 | 33 | 9 | 24.8 | 47.2 | 0 | 86.8 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-16 | 28 | 565 | 45.8 | 30.7 | 7 | 34.2 | 58 | 0 | 106.3 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-17 | 15 | 126 | 48.1 | 30.4 | 6 | 27.5 | 43.9 | 0 | 92.7 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-18 | 28 | 545 | 49.9 | 28.2 | 7 | 14.7 | 23 | 0 | 70.5 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-19 | 10 | 137 | 50.1 | 28.5 | 8 | 12.2 | 25.9 | 0 | 67 | extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-20 | 2 | 3 | 49.7 | 30.3 | 9 | 25.4 | 40 | 0 | 89.7 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-21 | 19 | 558 | 49.6 | 34.5 | 7 | 38.2 | 65.2 | 0 | 117.8 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-22 | 0 | 0 | 45.8 | 32.3 | 10 | 26.3 | 45.4 | 0 | 88.7 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-23 | 0 | 0 | 42 | 28 | 14 | 21.1 | 37.4 | 0 | 71.5 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-24 | 0 | 0 | 44 | 28.9 | 12 | 12.6 | 24.1 | 0 | 59.4 | extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-25 | 3 | 45 | 46.8 | 29.8 | 9 | 12.6 | 28.1 | 0 | 60.5 | extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-26 | 0 | 0 | 43.3 | 32 | 12 | 27.7 | 49.3 | 0 | 84.7 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-27 | 0 | 0 | 43.6 | 28.9 | 10 | 26 | 46.1 | 0 | 81.9 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-28 | 0 | 0 | 45.7 | 29.5 | 8 | 30.6 | 49.7 | 0 | 90.8 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-29 | 0 | 0 | 49 | 28.7 | 6 | 23.9 | 38.9 | 0 | 83.6 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2022-06-30 | 0 | 0 | 50 | 29.9 | 6 | 26.3 | 43.6 | 0 | 89.2 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2022-07-01 | 0 | 0 | 49.4 | 32.3 | 7 | 35.6 | 58 | 0 | 108.9 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2022-07-02 | 0 | 0 | 46.5 | 33.3 | 9 | 41.7 | 70.2 | 0 | 124.1 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2022-07-03 | 0 | 0 | 45.2 | 30.4 | 12 | 31 | 50 | 0 | 94.5 | muy_extremo | 0 |
| 2022-07-04 | 0 | 0 | 46.3 | 29.5 | 12 | 16.1 | 30.6 | 0 | 68.7 | extremo | 0 |
| 2022-07-05 | 0 | 0 | 47.1 | 31 | 10 | 20.6 | 37.4 | 0 | 76.2 | muy_extremo | 0 |
| 2022-07-06 | 0 | 0 | 47.2 | 31.2 | 11 | 18.7 | 33.1 | 0 | 73.4 | muy_extremo | 0 |
| 2022-07-07 | 0 | 0 | 47 | 31.8 | 9 | 15.9 | 31.7 | 0 | 69.3 | extremo | 0 |
| 2022-07-08 | 0 | 0 | 47.4 | 30.1 | 8 | 26.6 | 43.2 | 0 | 87.8 | muy_extremo | 0 |
| 2022-07-09 | 0 | 0 | 46.5 | 31.6 | 10 | 19.3 | 34.6 | 0 | 75.3 | muy_extremo | 0 |
| 2022-07-10 | 0 | 0 | 48.3 | 31.9 | 11 | 22.7 | 36.4 | 0 | 81.3 | muy_extremo | 0 |
| 2022-07-11 | 0 | 0 | 45.9 | 33.2 | 13 | 23.1 | 37.1 | 0 | 79.3 | muy_extremo | 0 |
| 2022-07-12 | 0 | 0 | 45.6 | 32 | 14 | 21.5 | 41.4 | 0 | 75 | 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
- 8,615ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 35days
- 29 May 2022 – 2 Jul 2022
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- districts
- Started on
- 29 May
- 2022
- Heat detections
- 181
- in a single hotspot: 153 MW
- Danger at start
- 68
- Extreme · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 436MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
HOTSPOTS BY DAY
29 May2 Jul
25 Jun 2022
How it evolved, day by day
14 Jun
18 Jun
21 Jun
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
50°high
70km/h · peak gust
5%lowest humidity
It had gone 28 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
98% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,574 ha in 2016, 94 ha in 2017, 5,767 ha in 2018, 237 ha in 2020, 8,976 ha in 2021. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 8,452 ha that had burned before.
- 3,110 ha Al-Kahla fire, August 2021 2,798 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,974 ha Al-Kahla fire, September 2018 5,576 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,270 ha Al-Kahla fire, January 2016 3,138 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,152 ha Al-Kahla fire, June 2021 1,975 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,149 ha Al-Kahla fire, September 2021 1,171 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 851 ha Al-Kahla fire, March 2018 2,797 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 595 ha Al-Kahla fire, February 2016 2,560 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 365 ha Al-Kahla fire, March 2018 1,627 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
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-Kahla where it started8,997 ha reached on 31 May2.5 %
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 2020Built-up area< 0.1 ha
Residents< 20
Inside the perimeter there was no noticeable built-up land and almost nobody lived there (GHSL 2020, 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.
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
| Day | High | Min. humidity | Peak gust | Rain | Danger (FWI) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 29 May | 42.7 °C | 7 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 68 |
| 30 May | 44.5 °C | 8 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 74 |
| 31 May | 45.7 °C | 8 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 66 |
| 1 Jun | 46.4 °C | 7 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 63 |
| 2 Jun | 46.9 °C | 7 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 64 |
| 3 Jun | 48.1 °C | 6 % | 18 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 62 |
| 4 Jun | 48.7 °C | 7 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 64 |
| 5 Jun | 49.3 °C | 6 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 70 |
| 6 Jun | 49.2 °C | 8 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 67 |
| 7 Jun | 50.2 °C | 6 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 66 |
| 8 Jun | 49.4 °C | 8 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 75 |
| 9 Jun | 48.2 °C | 8 % | 43 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 92 |
| 10 Jun | 45.0 °C | 5 % | 59 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 110 |
| 11 Jun | 44.5 °C | 8 % | 59 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 110 |
| 12 Jun | 45.5 °C | 9 % | 50 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 98 |
| 13 Jun | 46.2 °C | 9 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 74 |
| 14 Jun | 45.5 °C | 9 % | 43 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 84 |
| 15 Jun | 45.8 °C | 9 % | 47 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 87 |
| 16 Jun | 45.8 °C | 7 % | 58 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 106 |
| 17 Jun | 48.1 °C | 6 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 93 |
| 18 Jun | 49.9 °C | 7 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 70 |
| 19 Jun | 50.1 °C | 8 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 67 |
| 20 Jun | 49.7 °C | 9 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 90 |
| 21 Jun | 49.6 °C | 7 % | 65 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 118 |
| 22 Jun | 45.8 °C | 10 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 89 |
| 23 Jun | 42.0 °C | 14 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 72 |
| 24 Jun | 44.0 °C | 12 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 59 |
| 25 Jun | 46.8 °C | 9 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 60 |
| 26 Jun | 43.3 °C | 12 % | 49 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 85 |
| 27 Jun | 43.6 °C | 10 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 82 |
| 28 Jun | 45.7 °C | 8 % | 50 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 91 |
| 29 Jun | 49.0 °C | 6 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 84 |
| 30 Jun | 50.0 °C | 6 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 89 |
| 1 Jul | 49.4 °C | 7 % | 58 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 109 |
| 2 Jul | 46.5 °C | 9 % | 70 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 124 |
| 3 Jul after | 45.2 °C | 12 % | 50 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 94 |
| 4 Jul after | 46.3 °C | 12 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 69 |
| 5 Jul after | 47.1 °C | 10 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 76 |
| 6 Jul after | 47.2 °C | 11 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 73 |
| 7 Jul after | 47.0 °C | 9 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 69 |
| 8 Jul after | 47.4 °C | 8 % | 43 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 88 |
| 9 Jul after | 46.5 °C | 10 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 75 |
| 10 Jul after | 48.3 °C | 11 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 81 |
| 11 Jul after | 45.9 °C | 13 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 79 |
| 12 Jul after | 45.6 °C | 14 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 75 |
Its twins: fires that started in the same weather
It started with an FWI of 68.2, a minimum humidity of 7% and 28 days without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2016: 25.
FWI at the start
68.2
Minimum humidity
7 %
Days without rain
28
this fire
chosen twins
rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar
Outlines of the closest twins
This fire · Al-Kahla fire, May 2022
8,615 ha
35 days
FWI 68.2
Min. humidity 7 %
Andimeshk fire, June 2019
1,488 ha
2 days
FWI 66.9
Min. humidity 8 %
134 km away, in 2019
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
Hamidieh fire, May 2020
1,195 ha
1 day
FWI 68.7
Min. humidity 6 %
69 km away, in 2020
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
Abdanan County fire, May 2017
1,137 ha
3 days
FWI 71.1
Min. humidity 10 %
133 km away, in 2017
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
Dehloran County fire, May 2019
1,380 ha
4 days
FWI 70.9
Min. humidity 9 %
103 km away, in 2019
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
Darreh Shahr County fire, June 2017
1,396 ha
2 days
FWI 65.2
Min. humidity 7 %
137 km away, in 2017
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
What happened to them
- 5 days
- median duration
- 1,411 ha
- median area
- 100 %
- went past 1,000 ha
- 1.7 mm
- rain at the end (median; 3 of 25 had it)
It was 6.1 times larger than the median of its twins and lasted 35 days, against 5 days.
None of its 25 twins burned more. The weather on the first day does not explain everything: the wind in the following days, the fuel and the firefighting also count. In 22 of 25, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 1.7 mm.
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
70km/h · max. gust
It was considered over on 2 Jul, and not even 1 mm fell in the following ten days: it went out without rain. Twins with rain when they ended: 3 of 25, with a median of 1.7 mm.
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 · 22 May 2022
After · 9 Jul 2022
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.
Detections table · 181Every 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
- 2,798 haAl-KahlaAugust 2021 · 22 days · 2 km away
- 5,576 haAl-KahlaSeptember 2018 · 33 days · 3 km away
- 3,138 haAl-KahlaJanuary 2016 · 3 days · 5 km away
- 2,797 haAl-Kahla15 March 2018 · 3 days · 6 km away
- 2,560 haAl-KahlaFebruary 2016 · 14 days · 11 km away
- 3,563 haAl-Kahla14 March 2025 · 12 days · 12 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Al-Kahla fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 29 May 2022 and 2 July 2022: 35 days between the first and last heat detection of the perimeter.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 8,615 hectares (86.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Al-Kahla (8,997 ha, 2.5 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 50.2 °C, humidity dropped to 5 % and gusts hit 70 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 124, 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.
- How did the fires that started in similar weather in this area end?
- Fires less than 250 km away that started since 2016 with a similar FWI, humidity and dry spell: 25. Their median duration was 5 days and their median area 1,411 ha; 100 % went past 1,000 ha. None of its 25 twins burned more. The weather on the first day does not explain everything: the wind in the following days, the fuel and the firefighting also count. In 22 of 25, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 1.7 mm.
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 · 1 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
- Area: 9,182 → 8,615 ha.
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; 3 polygons grouped in this page.
- Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 181 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 2020, 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.