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SY · Syria · –

Daret Azza fire, 16 May 2024 Daret Azza

Out · last detection 20 May 2024, 22:25 UTC

The fire started on 16 May 2024 in Daret Azza, Syria, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 128 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 50th largest in Aleppo since 2016 (of 59 with a page). Number 41 in Syria in 2024, of 49.

The power measured by the satellite is low (9.2 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
128ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
7days
16 May 2024 – 22 May 2024
Municipalities hit
1
subdistricts
Started on
16 May
2024
Heat detections
3
in a single hotspot: 9 MW
Danger at start
24
High · FWI index
Average daily power
6MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 16 May22 May
20 May 2024

How it evolved, day by day

17 May 2024 · 9 MW · 1 20 May 2024 · 3 MW · 2
17 May 20 May

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

The weather it burned in

34°high
50km/h · peak gust
20%lowest humidity

It had gone one day without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 4.9 mm on 24 May.

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

  1. Daret Azza where it started
    128 ha reached on 17 May
    0.6 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the official perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.

What burned

  • Other natural land91 %
  • Agricultural areas9.4 %

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

People and buildings inside the perimeter

GHSL 2025
Built-up area0.37 ha
Residents≈ 30

Inside the perimeter there were about 0.37 hectares of built-up land and about 30 residents (GHSL 2025, satellite-based estimate).

This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned. The GHSL 2025 epoch is a projection made from 2020 and earlier data.

Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu

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 May 27.4 °C 29 % 49 km/h 1.3 mm High 24
17 May 28.0 °C 34 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
18 May 30.5 °C 31 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
19 May 32.1 °C 25 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
20 May 32.7 °C 24 % 43 km/h 0.5 mm High 34
21 May 33.6 °C 20 % 47 km/h 0.1 mm Very high 44
22 May 33.7 °C 22 % 48 km/h 0.2 mm Very high 48
23 May after 32.8 °C 28 % 52 km/h 0.8 mm High 36
24 May after 25.3 °C 39 % 53 km/h 4.9 mm Low 7

Its twins: fires that started in the same weather

It started with an FWI of 23.5, a minimum humidity of 29% and 1 day without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2016: 27.

FWI at the start 23.5
Minimum humidity 29 %
Days without rain 1
this fire chosen twins rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar

Outlines of the closest twins

Harbanifse fire, May 2017
835 ha 1 day FWI 21.4 Min. humidity 25 % 150 km away, in 2017

First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.

What happened to them

3 days
median duration
234 ha
median area
26 %
went past 1,000 ha
3.4 mm
rain at the end (median; 12 of 27 had it)

It stayed below its twins: 128 ha against a median of 234 ha. It lasted 7 days, against 3 days.

In 15 of 27, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 3.4 mm.

This is a bank of analogues: it shows what usually happens, not what will happen. With fewer than 15 twins we give no figures. How we calculate it

How it ended

4.9 mmfirst rain
24 May2 days after it ended
50km/h · max. gust

It was considered over on 22 May, and on 24 May 4.9 mm fell. We do not know whether the rain or the firefighters put it out. Twins with rain when they ended: 12 of 27, with a median of 3.4 mm.

Weather on this page: Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)

How a twin is chosen

  • Same area: fires that have already ended, less than 250 km from this one, since 2016.
  • Same start: we compare the FWI on the first day, the minimum humidity that day and the run of days without rain before it. The slider sets how much they may differ.
  • Only pages with final weather data (ERA5 reanalysis) calculated in the same way as this fire’s; agricultural and grass burns and pages with data under review are left out.
  • Fires burning at the same time as this one (a week before or after) are left out: they share the same spell of weather and do not count as a precedent.
  • They are sorted by similarity, and the outlines of the first five are drawn.

How we calculate it

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 9 May 2024
After · 29 May 2024

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 20 May 2024 the air beside the fire reached 34 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 27: 1.8 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak34 µg/m³
Days over the guideline4 days
PM1093 µg/m³
Optical depth0.43
15 May17 May19 May21 May
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 Syria

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Daret Azza fire last?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 16 May 2024 to 22 May 2024 (7 days). The perimeter dates it from 17 May 2024 to 18 May 2024.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 128 hectares (1.3 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Daret Azza (128 ha, 0.6 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 33.7 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 50 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 48, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Syria (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.
How did the fires that started in similar weather in this area end?
Fires less than 250 km away that started since 2016 with a similar FWI, humidity and dry spell: 27. Their median duration was 3 days and their median area 234 ha; 26 % went past 1,000 ha. In 15 of 27, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 3.4 mm.

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

History of this page · 2 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
  1. Last day with fire: 18 May 2024 → 22 May 2024.
  2. Start date: 17 May 2024 → 16 May 2024.

RSS Changes to this page With cross-checks and a citable version

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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How we know this
  • Perimeter: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
  • Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 17 May 2024 to 18 May 2024. 3 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
  • We have not matched this page with any official record.
  • Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
  • Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2025, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.

How we build fire pages: methodology

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 3.0 Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY 3.0 IGO)). 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.