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Chhaeb fire, February 2017 Thala Barivat, Chhaeb

Out · last detection 5 Mar 2017, 06:03 UTC

The fire started on 24 February 2017 in Chhaeb, Cambodia, and satellites saw it burning for 9 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 7,380 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 7th largest in Preah Vihear since 2016 (of 82 with a page). Number 5 in Cambodia in 2017, of 57.

Burnt area
7,380ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
9days
24 Feb 2017 – 4 Mar 2017
Municipalities hit
2
districts
Started on
24 Feb
2017
Heat detections
365
in a single hotspot: 48 MW
Danger at start
21
Moderate · FWI index
Energy released
2.4GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

5 Mar 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 24 Feb4 Mar

How it evolved, day by day

242526272812345

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

The weather it burned in

37°high
32km/h · peak gust
24%lowest humidity

It had gone 0 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.2 mm on 14 Mar.

This area had burned before

15% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,134 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Thala Barivat
    3,997 ha reached on 26 Feb
    1.5 %
  2. Chhaeb where it started
    3,432 ha reached on 24 Feb
    1.3 %

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)
24 Feb 37.1 °C 30 % 26 km/h 0.5 mm Moderate 21
25 Feb 34.1 °C 46 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
26 Feb 35.2 °C 39 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 21
27 Feb 34.9 °C 35 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
28 Feb 35.5 °C 31 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
1 Mar 34.7 °C 36 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
2 Mar 35.1 °C 29 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
3 Mar 35.4 °C 27 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
4 Mar 36.2 °C 24 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
5 Mar after 36.3 °C 30 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
6 Mar after 36.3 °C 34 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
7 Mar after 36.1 °C 33 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
8 Mar after 36.2 °C 29 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
9 Mar after 35.4 °C 29 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
10 Mar after 36.6 °C 33 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
11 Mar after 37.7 °C 33 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
12 Mar after 35.5 °C 41 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
13 Mar after 36.6 °C 42 % 23 km/h 0.1 mm High 28
14 Mar after 37.6 °C 39 % 28 km/h 1.2 mm High 24

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 17 Feb 2017
After · 11 Mar 2017

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 · 365Every 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 Cambodia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Chhaeb fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 24 February 2017 and 4 March 2017: 9 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 7,380 hectares (73.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Thala Barivat (3,997 ha, 1.5 %); Chhaeb (3,432 ha, 1.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 37.1 °C, humidity dropped to 24 % and gusts hit 32 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 30, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Cambodia (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.

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.

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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 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 from each country’s official figure.