Gali fire, 11 March 2026 Gali
The fire started on 11 March 2026 in Gali, Georgia, and satellites saw it burning for 3 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 356 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 52th largest in Abkhazia since 2016 (of 70 with a page). Number 24 in Georgia in 2026, of 37.
We have the GWIS perimeter for this fire, but not yet its hotspots: NASA publishes the yearly hotspot archive only once the year closes. The page picks them up automatically when they are available.
- Burnt area
- 356ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 3days
- 11 Mar 2026 – 13 Mar 2026
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- municipalities
- Started on
- 11 Mar
- 2026
- Danger at start
- 0
- Very low · FWI index
Where it burned
The weather it burned in
It had gone 0 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 7.2 mm on 16 Mar.
This area had burned before
96% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 294 ha in 2016, 6 ha in 2017, 55 ha in 2018, 81 ha in 2019, 167 ha in 2020, 12 ha in 2022, 85 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 342 ha that had burned before.
- 258 ha Gali fire, February 2016 540 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 167 ha Gali fire, March 2020 375 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 6 ha Gali fire, March 2017 403 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Gali where it started356 ha0.4 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 11 Mar | 16.6 °C | 39 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very low 0 |
| 12 Mar | 15.6 °C | 44 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very low 0 |
| 13 Mar | 15.5 °C | 41 % | 21 km/h | 0.1 mm | Very low 1 |
| 14 Mar after | 16.9 °C | 40 % | 29 km/h | 0.1 mm | Very low 2 |
| 15 Mar after | 19.4 °C | 42 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very low 3 |
| 16 Mar after | 13.8 °C | 65 % | 18 km/h | 7.2 mm | Very low 0 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
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 · CopernicusOn 16 March 2026 the air beside the fire reached 10 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).
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)
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Gali fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 11 March 2026 and 13 March 2026: 3 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 356 hectares (3.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Gali (356 ha, 0.4 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 16.6 °C, humidity dropped to 39 % and gusts hit 26 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 1, class Very low.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Georgia (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
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 (Public Domain). 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.