Skip to content
worldfires
DZ · Algeria · →

Chemini fire, July 2026 شميني · Chemini, Ouzellaguen

Out · last detection 17 Jul 2026, 01:02 UTC

The fire started on 16 July 2026 in Chemini, Algeria, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 312 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 47th largest in Bejaia since 2016 (of 101 with a page). Number 109 in Algeria in 2026, of 197.

The power measured by the satellite is low (3.0 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
312ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
1day
16 Jul 2026 – 16 Jul 2026
Municipalities hit
2
communes
Started on
16 Jul
2026
Heat detections
3
in a single hotspot: 3 MW
Danger at start
57
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
7MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 16 Jul16 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

17

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

The weather it burned in

42°high
27km/h · peak gust
6%lowest humidity

It had gone 8 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

4% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 14 ha in 2023.

What happened to each town

  1. Chemini شميني 15,274 inhabitants · 1.7 km from the town where it started
    264 ha reached on 17 Jul
    6.6 %
  2. Ouzellaguen أوزلاقن 22,719 inhabitants · 2.8 km from the town
    49 ha reached on 17 Jul
    0.8 %

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 land73 %
  • Mixed forest26 %

Land cover inside the perimeter as reported by Copernicus EFFIS (outside the Corine Land Cover area).

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 42.5 °C 6 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
17 Jul after 42.5 °C 6 % 16 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
18 Jul after 41.7 °C 8 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
19 Jul after 42.7 °C 6 % 18 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
20 Jul after 42.8 °C 7 % 20 km/h 0.1 mm Extreme 59
21 Jul after 42.5 °C 7 % 28 km/h 0.5 mm Very extreme 73
22 Jul after 41.8 °C 7 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 63
23 Jul after 42.2 °C 7 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 78
24 Jul after 41.5 °C 9 % 18 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 63
25 Jul after 40.5 °C 13 % 18 km/h 0.1 mm Extreme 60
26 Jul after 35.2 °C 17 % 18 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 9 Jul 2026
After · 23 Jul 2026

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 18 July 2026 the air beside the fire reached 45 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 24: 1.6 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak45 µg/m³
Days over the guideline2 days
PM1083 µg/m³
Optical depth0.50
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 · 3Every 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 Algeria ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Chemini fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 16 July 2026 and 16 July 2026: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 312 hectares (3.1 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Chemini (264 ha, 6.6 %); Ouzellaguen (49 ha, 0.8 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 1.7 km of Chemini. 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 42.5 °C, humidity dropped to 6 % and gusts hit 27 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 57, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Algeria (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: 14 · 1021

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 14 · 1021.

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 ADM3 (Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0). 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.