How long did the Bijapur fire last?

GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 11 April 2026 and 23 April 2026: 13 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 5,091 hectares (50.9 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 2 municipalities: Bijapur (4,111 ha, 2.7 %); BADE BACHELI (1,005 ha, 1.6 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 38.8 °C, humidity dropped to 23 % and gusts hit 37 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 39, class Very high.

Where does this data come from?

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

IN · India · 2026-04-11 → 2026-04-23

Bijapur fire, April 2026 Bijapur, BADE BACHELI

Out · last detection 24 Apr 2026, 08:26 UTC

The fire started on 11 April 2026 in Bijapur, India, and satellites saw it burning for 13 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 5,091 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 36th largest in Chhattīsgarh since 2016 (of 37 with a page). Number 64 in India in 2026, of 65.

The power measured by the satellite is low (22.9 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: 5,091ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 13days; 11 Apr 2026 – 23 Apr 2026
Municipalities hit: 2; subdistricts
Started on: 11 Apr; 2026
Heat detections: 212; in a single hotspot: 23 MW
Danger at start: 18; Moderate · FWI index
Energy released: 712MW; sum of detected power

Play back 24 Apr 2026

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 11 Apr23 Apr

How it evolved, day by day

111213141516171820212224

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

The weather it burned in

39°high

37km/h · peak gust

23%lowest humidity

It had gone 0 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.1 mm on 28 Apr.

This area had burned before

90% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 3,207 ha in 2016, 1,890 ha in 2017, 971 ha in 2019, 477 ha in 2021, 313 ha in 2022, 358 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 4,559 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

Bijapur where it started

4,111 ha reached on 10 Apr

2.7 %
BADE BACHELI

1,005 ha reached on 11 Apr

1.6 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS 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.

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	Rain	Danger (FWI)
4 Apr	33.7 °C	42 %	24 km/h	0.7 mm	Moderate 18
5 Apr	34.2 °C	40 %	28 km/h	0.1 mm	High 23
6 Apr	32.9 °C	47 %	37 km/h	0.1 mm	High 25
7 Apr	33.3 °C	41 %	32 km/h	0.1 mm	High 24
8 Apr	35.3 °C	31 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	High 30
9 Apr	33.2 °C	44 %	37 km/h	0.4 mm	High 27
10 Apr	36.2 °C	30 %	20 km/h	0.0 mm	High 27
11 Apr	38.8 °C	23 %	22 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
12 Apr	37.3 °C	29 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
13 Apr	36.5 °C	35 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
14 Apr	37.3 °C	32 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
15 Apr	37.2 °C	30 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
16 Apr	37.0 °C	33 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
17 Apr	37.8 °C	32 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
18 Apr	38.1 °C	33 %	32 km/h	0.2 mm	High 36
19 Apr	38.1 °C	35 %	29 km/h	2.1 mm	Moderate 21
20 Apr	37.2 °C	35 %	31 km/h	0.2 mm	High 28
21 Apr	36.9 °C	35 %	28 km/h	2.4 mm	Moderate 17
22 Apr	37.3 °C	35 %	26 km/h	0.6 mm	High 25
23 Apr	37.2 °C	30 %	19 km/h	0.0 mm	High 29
24 Apr after	37.9 °C	28 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	High 32
25 Apr after	37.9 °C	30 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
26 Apr after	37.3 °C	34 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
27 Apr after	37.5 °C	36 %	37 km/h	0.1 mm	High 37
28 Apr after	36.5 °C	39 %	40 km/h	1.1 mm	High 28

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 4 Apr 2026

After · 30 Apr 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 5 April 2026 the air beside the fire reached 59 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 46: 3.1 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak59 µg/m³

Days over the guideline28 days

PM1071 µg/m³

Optical depth1.05

WHO 15

234567891011121314151617181920212223242526272829

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 · 212Every 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 India ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Bijapur fire last?: GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 11 April 2026 and 23 April 2026: 13 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 5,091 hectares (50.9 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 2 municipalities: Bijapur (4,111 ha, 2.7 %); BADE BACHELI (1,005 ha, 1.6 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 38.8 °C, humidity dropped to 23 % and gusts hit 37 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 39, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?: From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of India (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: 112

Satellite cross-check

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · 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.

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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 ADM3 (Open Data Commons Open Database License 1.0). 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.

Where it burned