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Chitinsky District fire, 1 May 2025 Chitinsky District, Yeravninsky Rayon

Out · last detection 29 May 2025, 18:46 UTC

The fire started on 1 May 2025 in Chitinsky District, Russia, and satellites saw it burning for 29 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 53,650 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 12th largest in Zabaykalsky Krai since 2016 (of 470 with a page). Number 8 in Russia in 2025, of 249.

Burnt area
53,650ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
29days
1 May 2025 – 29 May 2025
Municipalities hit
2
districts
Started on
1 May
2025
Heat detections
3,412
in a single hotspot: 224 MW
Danger at start
8
Low · FWI index
Energy released
37.5GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

29 May 2025
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 1 May29 May

How it evolved, day by day

123456789101112131415171920212223242526272829

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

The weather it burned in

30°high
80km/h · peak gust
12%lowest humidity

It had gone one day without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 3.3 mm on 30 May.

This area had burned before

1% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 391 ha in 2024.

What happened to each town

  1. Chitinsky District where it started
    53,744 ha reached on 1 May
    3.4 %
  2. Yeravninsky Rayon
    640 ha reached on 22 May
    0.0 %

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 Apr 6.3 °C 13 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Low 8
25 Apr 12.8 °C 17 % 55 km/h 1.1 mm Low 9
26 Apr 3.5 °C 12 % 60 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 14
27 Apr 11.4 °C 17 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 14
28 Apr 18.1 °C 16 % 66 km/h 0.1 mm High 22
29 Apr 2.9 °C 51 % 80 km/h 8.5 mm Very low 0
30 Apr 6.9 °C 52 % 66 km/h 1.8 mm Very low 1
1 May 11.6 °C 21 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very low 3
2 May 8.1 °C 16 % 56 km/h 0.0 mm Low 9
3 May 7.4 °C 15 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Low 10
4 May 10.5 °C 16 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Low 10
5 May 11.8 °C 13 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 13
6 May 13.7 °C 12 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 13
7 May 11.6 °C 26 % 35 km/h 0.6 mm Moderate 12
8 May 12.5 °C 13 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 14
9 May 17.1 °C 14 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
10 May 20.2 °C 19 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
11 May 16.8 °C 20 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
12 May 19.9 °C 26 % 40 km/h 0.1 mm Moderate 20
13 May 11.5 °C 16 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
14 May 7.9 °C 32 % 38 km/h 0.2 mm Moderate 16
15 May 9.2 °C 20 % 45 km/h 4.3 mm Very low 2
16 May 10.6 °C 18 % 30 km/h 0.2 mm Very low 4
17 May 10.6 °C 22 % 38 km/h 1.2 mm Low 6
18 May 9.1 °C 24 % 36 km/h 0.3 mm Low 10
19 May 12.7 °C 17 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
20 May 14.2 °C 21 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
21 May 15.2 °C 18 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm High 21
22 May 18.4 °C 18 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19
23 May 20.2 °C 25 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
24 May 21.8 °C 25 % 34 km/h 0.4 mm Moderate 20
25 May 23.3 °C 21 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
26 May 26.6 °C 20 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
27 May 27.9 °C 18 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
28 May 30.4 °C 22 % 58 km/h 0.3 mm High 32
29 May 14.2 °C 22 % 46 km/h 0.4 mm High 29
30 May after 13.5 °C 30 % 47 km/h 3.3 mm Very low 5

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 24 Apr 2025
After · 5 Jun 2025

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 11 May 2025 the air beside the fire reached 535 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 314: 21 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak535 µg/m³
Days over the guideline27 days
PM10542 µg/m³
Optical depth3.55
2930123456789101112131415161718192021222324252627282930311
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 · 3,412Every 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 Russia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Chitinsky District fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 1 May 2025 and 29 May 2025: 29 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 53,650 hectares (536.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Chitinsky District (53,744 ha, 3.4 %); Yeravninsky Rayon (640 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 30.4 °C, humidity dropped to 12 % and gusts hit 80 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 32, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Russia (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
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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 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 (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.