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Burgas fire, 16 July 2016 Бургас · Burgas

Out · last detection 16 Jul 2016, 12:07 UTC

The fire started on 16 July 2016 in Burgas, Bulgaria, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 188 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 24th largest in Burgas since 2016 (of 33 with a page). Number 18 in Bulgaria in 2016, of 24.

The power measured by the satellite is low (15.9 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
188ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
1day
16 Jul 2016 – 16 Jul 2016
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
16 Jul
2016
Heat detections
5
in a single hotspot: 16 MW
Danger at start
10
Low · FWI index
Energy released
56MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 16 Jul16 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

16

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

The weather it burned in

26°high
36km/h · peak gust
68%lowest humidity

It had gone 8 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

  1. Burgas Бургас 189,086 inhabitants · 15.6 km from the town where it started
    189 ha reached on 16 Jul
    0.3 %

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 land81 %
  • Scrub and transitional woodland16 %
  • Mixed forest2.1 %
  • Agricultural areas1.6 %

Natura 2000 protected area affected: 100 %

Natura 2000 sites (European Environment Agency, 2024 release) crossed by the perimeter.

Land cover inside the perimeter according to Corine Land Cover, as reported by Copernicus.

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)
16 Jul 26.1 °C 68 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Low 10
17 Jul after 28.5 °C 49 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 13
18 Jul after 26.4 °C 44 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
19 Jul after 25.4 °C 48 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 13
20 Jul after 24.6 °C 46 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 15
21 Jul after 25.9 °C 47 % 18 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 12
22 Jul after 28.1 °C 40 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 15
23 Jul after 29.5 °C 44 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
24 Jul after 28.4 °C 51 % 30 km/h 0.4 mm Moderate 18
25 Jul after 28.5 °C 47 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
26 Jul after 27.9 °C 51 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 9 Jul 2016
After · 23 Jul 2016

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 17 July 2016 the air beside the fire reached 17 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak17 µg/m³
Days over the guideline0 days
PM1024 µg/m³
141516171819
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 · 5Every 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 timeSatelliteFRP (MW)LatLon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Bulgaria ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Burgas fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 16 July 2016 and 16 July 2016: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 188 hectares (1.9 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Burgas (189 ha, 0.3 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 15.6 km of Burgas. 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 26.1 °C, humidity dropped to 68 % and gusts hit 36 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 10, class Low.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Bulgaria (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

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?

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 112.

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 ADM2 (Public Domain). 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.