How long did the Chashka fire last?

Copernicus dates it between 18 September 2021 and 18 September 2021: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.

How much area did it burn?

The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 134 hectares (1.3 km²). Official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire only entered Chashka (134 ha, 0.2 %).

Did the fire reach a town?

The closest fire to a town centre came within 21.0 km of Chashka. 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 22.8 °C, humidity dropped to 51 % and gusts hit 53 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 12, class Moderate.

Where does this data come from?

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

MK · North Macedonia · 2021-09-18 → 2021-09-18

Chashka fire, September 2021 Општина Чашка · Chashka

Out · last detection 18 Sept 2021, 01:46 UTC

The fire started on 18 September 2021 in Chashka, North Macedonia, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 134 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 43th largest in Vardar since 2016 (of 49 with a page). Number 31 in North Macedonia in 2021, of 36.

The power measured by the satellite is low (29.6 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: 134ha; Copernicus perimeter
Duration: 1day; 18 Sept 2021 – 18 Sept 2021
Municipalities hit: 1; municipalities
Started on: 18 Sept; 2021
Heat detections: 8; in a single hotspot: 30 MW
Danger at start: 12; Moderate · FWI index
Energy released: 60MW; sum of detected power

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 18 Sept18 Sept

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

23°high

53km/h · peak gust

51%lowest humidity

It had gone 8 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 10.9 mm on 28 Sept.

This area had burned before

64% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 86 ha in 2017.

86 ha Chashka fire, August 2017 442 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire

What happened to each town

Chashka Општина Чашка 7,942 inhabitants · 21.0 km from the town where it started

134 ha reached on 18 Sept

0.2 %

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

Scrub and transitional woodland64 %
Broadleaved forest19 %
Agricultural areas13 %
Other natural land4.4 %

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)
18 Sept	22.8 °C	51 %	53 km/h	1.0 mm	Moderate 12
19 Sept after	26.1 °C	38 %	60 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 18
20 Sept after	26.5 °C	31 %	53 km/h	0.0 mm	High 25
21 Sept after	22.2 °C	39 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 21
22 Sept after	13.9 °C	56 %	42 km/h	0.1 mm	Moderate 17
23 Sept after	16.6 °C	29 %	44 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 20
24 Sept after	23.2 °C	19 %	21 km/h	0.0 mm	High 22
25 Sept after	26.4 °C	14 %	22 km/h	0.0 mm	High 29
26 Sept after	28.7 °C	13 %	19 km/h	0.0 mm	High 29
27 Sept after	29.4 °C	14 %	22 km/h	0.1 mm	High 31
28 Sept after	22.8 °C	47 %	25 km/h	10.9 mm	Very low 1

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 11 Sept 2021

After · 25 Sept 2021

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 17 September 2021 the air beside the fire reached 19 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 17: 1.1 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak19 µg/m³

Days over the guideline1 day

PM1039 µg/m³

WHO 15

161718192021

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 · 8Every 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 North Macedonia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Chashka fire last?: Copernicus dates it between 18 September 2021 and 18 September 2021: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?: The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 134 hectares (1.3 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire only entered Chashka (134 ha, 0.2 %).
Did the fire reach a town?: The closest fire to a town centre came within 21.0 km of Chashka. 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 22.8 °C, humidity dropped to 51 % and gusts hit 53 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 12, class Moderate.
Where does this data come from?: From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of North Macedonia (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: 193 · 112

Центар за управување со кризи ↗

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?

Your connection to the fire (optional) Email (optional)

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 193 · 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 (Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)). 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