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Datong County fire, April 2020 Datong County

Out · last measured on 30 Apr 2020

The fire started on 30 April 2020 in Datong County, China, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 1,071 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 69th largest in Shanxi Province since 2016 (of 78 with a page). Number 309 in China in 2020, of 348.

We have the GWIS perimeter for this fire, but the VIIRS sensors did not capture it in enough detail: no day-by-day evolution, but the split by municipality is there.

Burnt area
1,071ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
1day
30 Apr 2020 – 30 Apr 2020
Municipalities hit
1
counties
Started on
30 Apr
2020
Danger at start
38
High · FWI index

Where it burned

The weather it burned in

31°high
37km/h · peak gust
7%lowest humidity

It had gone 10 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 3.1 mm on 4 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. Datong County where it started
    1,074 ha
    0.7 %

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)
30 Apr 30.8 °C 7 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
1 May after 32.6 °C 7 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
2 May after 33.7 °C 7 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
3 May after 24.4 °C 23 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
4 May after 19.1 °C 33 % 25 km/h 3.1 mm Very low 4

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 23 Apr 2020
After · 7 May 2020

If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.

Other fires nearby

All fires in China ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Datong County fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 30 April 2020 and 30 April 2020: 1 day 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 1,071 hectares (10.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Datong County (1,074 ha, 0.7 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 30.8 °C, humidity dropped to 7 % and gusts hit 37 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 38, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of China (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: 119

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 119.

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 ADM3 (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.