Burned area
satellite only6,732ha
Perimeter published by GWIS (Copernicus).
- Source
- GWIS (Copernicus)
- Date
- 16 Mar 2021 – 4 Apr 2021
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page to compare it with.
IN · India · –
Mainatanr fire, March 2021 India
Out · last detection 4 Apr 2021, 19:16 UTC
The fire started on 16 March 2021 in Mainatanr, India, and satellites saw it burning for 20 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 6,732 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
Number 52 in India in 2021, of 77.
Use this data
Compare with…
Use this data
Fire page data · version 2026-10-26matches the official recordwith caveatssatellite onlymodel
When copying, the sentence is
Tick the figures you want: they make up the lede and the CSV.
Duration by satellite
satellite only20days
16 Mar 2021 to 4 Apr 2021: first and last day with fire on the page.
- Source
- GWIS (Copernicus) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- last detection: 4 Apr 2021, 19:16 UTC
+− cross-check
Satellites pass a few times a day and cloud or smoke can hide the fire: a lack of detections is not an official extinction. Each country’s emergency service declares a fire contained or out.
Start
satellite only16 Mar 2021
First day with fire seen by the satellites or the perimeter.
- Source
- GWIS (Copernicus) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- 16 Mar 2021
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page, so the alert time and the cause are not known here.
Hotspots
satellite only391
VIIRS detections at 375 m. Most intense hotspot: 43 MW.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (Suomi NPP)
- Date
- 16 Mar 2021 – 4 Apr 2021
+− cross-check
There is no official record to compare with. Each hotspot is a pixel detected in one satellite pass, not a separate fire.
The worst day
satellite only301MW
Total radiative power on 23 March 2021; hotspots that day: 29.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (FRP)
- Date
- 23 Mar 2021
+− cross-check
Fire radiative power (FRP) measures the energy the fire gives off when the satellite passes. Added up by day, it compares intensity, not area.
Danger at the start
model33.0FWI · high
Fire Weather Index (Canadian system) computed by WorldFires for the day the fire started. Consecutive days without rain before: 25.
- Source
- WorldFires calculation (Canadian FWI system)
- Date
- 16 Mar 2021, local noon
- Model
- ERA5 0,25° (ECMWF · Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com
+− cross-check
This is an index computed from weather model data, not a measurement of the fire nor an official warning. Danger warnings are issued by each country’s authority. Emergency number and official warnings
Weather during the fire
model35.4°C · 19% RH
High of 35.4 °C and minimum humidity of 19% on 22 March 2021; gusts of 47 km/h on 24 March 2021.
- Source
- weather model at the fire’s grid cell
- Date
- 16 Mar 2021 – 4 Apr 2021
- Model
- ERA5 0,25° (ECMWF · Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com
+− cross-check
These are model values for a cell of about 25 km, not from a weather station: they may differ from what was measured on the ground.
This page’s change log has been kept since 24 October 2026: every night what it publishes is compared and the difference is logged. Anything earlier is reconstructed from each source’s date and marked as reconstructed.
Show
-
· reconstructed weatherWeather and FWI computed from the ERA5 reanalysis
-
logLast day with fire: 30 March 2021 → 4 April 2021.
-
logStart date: 22 March 2021 → 16 March 2021.
-
· reconstructed GHSLPopulation and built-up area computed
What was saved on 26 October 2026
Every night a snapshot of what the page shows is saved. If anything changes, it appears in the list as a log entry.
- Area
- 6,732 ha
- Dates
- 16 Mar 2021 – 4 Apr 2021
- Name
- Mainatanr
- Official record
- —
Versioned permanent link
https://worldfires.org/en/fire/mainatanr-2021-03?v=2026-10-26A version keeps the area, dates, name and official record; the area as it was logged (changes under 2% are not logged). The map, hotspots and weather always show today’s data.
Citation
A lede of about 60 words figures only, no adjectives
CSV for this fire mainatanr-2021-03.csv · daily, no individual hotspots
| fecha | focos_viirs | frp_mw | tmax_c | tmin_c | hr_min_pct | viento_max_kmh | racha_max_kmh | precip_mm | fwi | clase_fwi | dentro_del_incendio |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2021-03-16 | 3 | 1 | 32 | 18.2 | 29 | 13.1 | 32 | 0 | 33 | alto | 1 |
| 2021-03-17 | 8 | 31 | 32.9 | 17.1 | 28 | 11.4 | 30.6 | 0 | 34 | alto | 1 |
| 2021-03-18 | 1 | 6 | 32.5 | 17.8 | 27 | 11.2 | 32.4 | 0 | 34.3 | alto | 1 |
| 2021-03-19 | 0 | 0 | 33.3 | 18 | 27 | 13.4 | 31 | 0 | 37.1 | alto | 1 |
| 2021-03-20 | 0 | 0 | 33.2 | 19.6 | 22 | 16.8 | 38.2 | 0.2 | 46.5 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2021-03-21 | 6 | 27 | 34.4 | 17.8 | 20 | 17.5 | 40 | 0 | 46.8 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2021-03-22 | 8 | 25 | 35.4 | 17.4 | 19 | 15.6 | 35.3 | 0 | 47.7 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2021-03-23 | 29 | 301 | 35.2 | 19.2 | 22 | 17.7 | 38.5 | 0 | 45.6 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2021-03-24 | 73 | 247 | 34.8 | 20.8 | 19 | 20 | 46.8 | 0.3 | 57.5 | extremo | 1 |
| 2021-03-25 | 79 | 159 | 34.3 | 18.2 | 15 | 20.2 | 43.2 | 0 | 62.2 | extremo | 1 |
| 2021-03-26 | 53 | 151 | 33.6 | 18.1 | 17 | 15.6 | 36 | 0 | 55.1 | extremo | 1 |
| 2021-03-27 | 57 | 162 | 33.2 | 17.5 | 21 | 8.7 | 27.4 | 0 | 46.8 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2021-03-28 | 46 | 117 | 33.3 | 17.1 | 23 | 10.3 | 28.4 | 0 | 46.4 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2021-03-29 | 1 | 1 | 34 | 17.4 | 24 | 13 | 31.7 | 0 | 43.7 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2021-03-30 | 13 | 65 | 34.5 | 19 | 30 | 13.3 | 33.5 | 0 | 43.8 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2021-03-31 | 5 | 9 | 30.7 | 20.6 | 47 | 14.5 | 34.9 | 0 | 30.4 | alto | 1 |
| 2021-04-01 | 0 | 0 | 32.9 | 19.3 | 20 | 15.3 | 34.9 | 0 | 37.6 | alto | 1 |
| 2021-04-02 | 4 | 7 | 34 | 17 | 15 | 11.9 | 33.1 | 0 | 47.6 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2021-04-03 | 3 | 14 | 34.4 | 16.6 | 7 | 14 | 35.3 | 0 | 46.4 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2021-04-04 | 2 | 3 | 34.7 | 16.4 | 16 | 9 | 28.1 | 0 | 49.1 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2021-04-05 | 0 | 0 | 34 | 16.5 | 19 | 17.1 | 39.2 | 0 | 57.9 | extremo | 0 |
| 2021-04-06 | 0 | 0 | 34.7 | 18.3 | 25 | 10.9 | 32.4 | 0 | 45.9 | muy_alto | 0 |
| 2021-04-07 | 0 | 0 | 35.5 | 21.1 | 30 | 16.8 | 41 | 0.6 | 42.4 | muy_alto | 0 |
| 2021-04-08 | 0 | 0 | 36.5 | 23 | 24 | 13.5 | 34.6 | 0 | 35.5 | alto | 0 |
| 2021-04-09 | 0 | 0 | 34.8 | 21.7 | 24 | 13.4 | 41 | 0.1 | 35.4 | alto | 0 |
| 2021-04-10 | 0 | 0 | 36.6 | 20.1 | 16 | 16.2 | 39.6 | 0 | 50.1 | extremo | 0 |
| 2021-04-11 | 0 | 0 | 37.9 | 18.3 | 12 | 15.9 | 35.3 | 0 | 62 | extremo | 0 |
| 2021-04-12 | 0 | 0 | 37.1 | 21.3 | 10 | 14.4 | 34.9 | 0 | 61.9 | extremo | 0 |
| 2021-04-13 | 0 | 0 | 37.2 | 20.4 | 16 | 16.9 | 41 | 0.1 | 59 | extremo | 0 |
| 2021-04-14 | 0 | 0 | 38 | 21.2 | 19 | 10.6 | 31.3 | 0 | 57.9 | extremo | 0 |
It is generated in your browser from this page’s data: one file per fire, aggregated by day and without individual hotspots.
Live widget for your story
It updates itself while the fire is still active and links to this page. Free, with the attribution shown at the bottom.
Sources for this page: GWIS (Copernicus), NASA FIRMS (VIIRS), ERA5 (ECMWF/Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0), GHSL (JRC). Open-Meteo.com · How we build fire pages: methodology
- Burnt area
- 6,732ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 20days
- 16 Mar 2021 – 4 Apr 2021
- Municipalities hit
- 0
- subdistricts
- Started on
- 16 Mar
- 2021
- Heat detections
- 391
- in a single hotspot: 43 MW
- Danger at start
- 33
- High · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 78MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
HOTSPOTS BY DAY
16 Mar4 Apr
4 Apr 2021
How it evolved, day by day
16 Mar
23 Mar
26 Mar
30 Mar
4 Apr
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
35°high
47km/h · peak gust
7%lowest humidity
It had gone 25 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
75% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,429 ha in 2016, 2,106 ha in 2017, 2,106 ha in 2018, 26 ha in 2019, 125 ha in 2020. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 5,075 ha that had burned before.
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
Berlin boundary: geoBoundaries · Federal Agency for Cartography and Geodesy (dl-de/by-2-0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
People and buildings inside the perimeter
GHSL 2020Built-up area< 0.1 ha
Residents< 20
Inside the perimeter there was no noticeable built-up land and almost nobody lived there (GHSL 2020, 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.
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 Mar | 32.0 °C | 29 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 17 Mar | 32.9 °C | 28 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 18 Mar | 32.5 °C | 27 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 19 Mar | 33.3 °C | 27 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 20 Mar | 33.2 °C | 22 % | 38 km/h | 0.2 mm | Very high 46 |
| 21 Mar | 34.4 °C | 20 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 22 Mar | 35.4 °C | 19 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 23 Mar | 35.2 °C | 22 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 24 Mar | 34.8 °C | 19 % | 47 km/h | 0.3 mm | Extreme 58 |
| 25 Mar | 34.3 °C | 15 % | 43 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 62 |
| 26 Mar | 33.6 °C | 17 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 55 |
| 27 Mar | 33.2 °C | 21 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 28 Mar | 33.3 °C | 23 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 29 Mar | 34.0 °C | 24 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 30 Mar | 34.5 °C | 30 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 31 Mar | 30.7 °C | 47 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 1 Apr | 32.9 °C | 20 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 38 |
| 2 Apr | 34.0 °C | 15 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 3 Apr | 34.4 °C | 7 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 4 Apr | 34.7 °C | 16 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 5 Apr after | 34.0 °C | 19 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 58 |
| 6 Apr after | 34.7 °C | 25 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 7 Apr after | 35.5 °C | 30 % | 41 km/h | 0.6 mm | Very high 42 |
| 8 Apr after | 36.5 °C | 24 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 9 Apr after | 34.8 °C | 24 % | 41 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 35 |
| 10 Apr after | 36.6 °C | 16 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 50 |
| 11 Apr after | 37.9 °C | 12 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 62 |
| 12 Apr after | 37.1 °C | 10 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 62 |
| 13 Apr after | 37.2 °C | 16 % | 41 km/h | 0.1 mm | Extreme 59 |
| 14 Apr after | 38.0 °C | 19 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 58 |
Its twins: fires that started in the same weather
It started with an FWI of 33.0, a minimum humidity of 29% and 25 days without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2016: 13.
FWI at the start
33.0
Minimum humidity
29 %
Days without rain
25
this fire
chosen twins
rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar
Outlines of the closest twins
This fire · Mainatanr fire, March 2021
6,732 ha
20 days
FWI 33.0
Min. humidity 29 %
Katari fire, March 2019
2,188 ha
7 days
FWI 30.9
Min. humidity 29 %
167 km away, in 2019
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 4.2 mm on 26 Mar.
Chitwan National Park fire, March 2025
2,193 ha
13 days
FWI 32.9
Min. humidity 32 %
10 km away, in 2025
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 1.4 mm on 9 Apr.
Sainamaina fire, April 2016
2,413 ha
15 days
FWI 32.6
Min. humidity 28 %
150 km away, in 2016
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
Mithila fire, March 2019
5,461 ha
8 days
FWI 31.9
Min. humidity 23 %
126 km away, in 2019
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 1.4 mm on 26 Mar.
Naubahini fire, April 2016
2,360 ha
11 days
FWI 30.8
Min. humidity 29 %
206 km away, in 2016
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 8.9 mm on 3 May.
What happened to them
Fires in the area that started in similar weather: 13. With fewer than 15 we give no figures: they would be more noise than signal.
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
—first rain
—no rain in ten days
47km/h · max. gust
It was considered over on 4 Apr, and not even 1 mm fell in the following ten days: it went out without rain.
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.
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
↔
Before · 9 Mar 2021
After · 11 Apr 2021
Sentinel-2 did not pass over on that day. Try another date, or use false colour, which is daily.
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 · 391Every 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 time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 8,547 haChitwan National Park6 April 2026 · 20 days · 13 km away
- 7,772 haChitwan National ParkMarch 2018 · 19 days · 13 km away
- 17,318 haChitwan National ParkMarch 2021 · 21 days · 16 km away
- 10,100 haChitwan National ParkMarch 2019 · 17 days · 16 km away
- 11,202 haGaunaha20 March 2021 · 16 days · 21 km away
- 9,696 haGaunahaApril 2023 · 15 days · 25 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Mainatanr fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 16 March 2021 to 4 April 2021 (20 days). The perimeter dates it from 22 March 2021 to 30 March 2021.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 6,732 hectares (67.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 35.4 °C, humidity dropped to 7 % and gusts hit 47 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 62, class Extreme.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of India (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 · Emergency number and official warnings
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.
- Last day with fire: 30 March 2021 → 4 April 2021.
- Start date: 22 March 2021 → 16 March 2021.
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.
Report an error
How we know this
- Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery.
- Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 22 March 2021 to 30 March 2021. 391 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 2020, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.
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.