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Gorny Ulus fire, 14 August 2020 Gorny Ulus, Khangalassky Ulus

Out · last detection 26 Sept 2020, 04:41 UTC

The fire started on 14 August 2020 in Gorny Ulus, Russia, and satellites saw it burning for 44 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 68,036 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 57th largest in Sakha Republic since 2016 (of 1422 with a page). Number 11 in Russia in 2020, of 592.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Gorny Ulus · 2021Gorny Ulus · 2017Gorny Ulus · 2017Gorny Ulus · 2021

Burnt area
68,036ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
44days
14 Aug 2020 – 26 Sept 2020
Municipalities hit
2
districts
Started on
14 Aug
2020
Heat detections
12,757
in a single hotspot: 543 MW
Danger at start
10
Low · FWI index
Average daily power
2.5GW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 14 Aug26 Sept
26 Sept 2020

How it evolved, day by day

14 Aug 2020 · 3 MW · 1 15 Aug 2020 · 3 MW · 2 16 Aug 2020 · 1 MW · 1 17 Aug 2020 · 1 MW · 1 18 Aug 2020 · 44 MW · 12 19 Aug 2020 · 38 MW · 9 20 Aug 2020 · 31 MW · 15 21 Aug 2020 · 91 MW · 32 22 Aug 2020 · 189 MW · 50 23 Aug 2020 · 95 MW · 29 24 Aug 2020 · 505 MW · 58 25 Aug 2020 · 243 MW · 55 26 Aug 2020 · 496 MW · 95 27 Aug 2020 · 1,244 MW · 244 28 Aug 2020 · 3,976 MW · 515 29 Aug 2020 · 20,249 MW · 701 30 Aug 2020 · 333 MW · 191 31 Aug 2020 · 757 MW · 90 3 Sept 2020 · 1,273 MW · 247 4 Sept 2020 · 2,256 MW · 310 5 Sept 2020 · 1,110 MW · 120 6 Sept 2020 · 56 MW · 20 7 Sept 2020 · 443 MW · 59 8 Sept 2020 · 48 MW · 22 9 Sept 2020 · 2,293 MW · 333 10 Sept 2020 · 13 MW · 5 11 Sept 2020 · 224 MW · 32 12 Sept 2020 · 1,268 MW · 398 13 Sept 2020 · 3,627 MW · 253 14 Sept 2020 · 9,709 MW · 1101 15 Sept 2020 · 3,946 MW · 981 16 Sept 2020 · 3,812 MW · 624 17 Sept 2020 · 1,806 MW · 352 18 Sept 2020 · 2,690 MW · 429 19 Sept 2020 · 1,826 MW · 362 20 Sept 2020 · 5,084 MW · 607 21 Sept 2020 · 5,951 MW · 839 22 Sept 2020 · 5,772 MW · 692 23 Sept 2020 · 6,487 MW · 825 24 Sept 2020 · 6,095 MW · 792 25 Sept 2020 · 6,144 MW · 846 26 Sept 2020 · 6,059 MW · 407
14 Aug 20 Aug 26 Aug 29 Aug 3 Sept 9 Sept 15 Sept 21 Sept

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

The weather it burned in

24°high
41km/h · peak gust
30%lowest humidity

It had gone 3 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 7.0 mm on 27 Sept.

This area had burned before

0% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 291 ha in 2017, 6 ha in 2018.

How big is it?

10 km
It burned the equivalent of 43% of the area of London (680 km² against 1,583 km²).

London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).

This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.

What happened to each town

  1. Gorny Ulus where it started
    42,482 ha reached on 14 Aug
    0.9 %
  2. Khangalassky Ulus
    24,423 ha reached on 28 Aug
    1.0 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS 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.

People and buildings inside the perimeter

GHSL 2020
Built-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)
14 Aug 15.8 °C 48 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Low 10
15 Aug 18.1 °C 40 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Low 11
16 Aug 13.7 °C 51 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Low 10
17 Aug 15.6 °C 51 % 26 km/h 0.2 mm Low 9
18 Aug 19.2 °C 35 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 13
19 Aug 22.4 °C 31 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
20 Aug 16.4 °C 53 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 13
21 Aug 19.8 °C 38 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 12
22 Aug 19.2 °C 32 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
23 Aug 18.3 °C 34 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 14
24 Aug 18.1 °C 38 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
25 Aug 16.5 °C 33 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 15
26 Aug 16.6 °C 36 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
27 Aug 18.8 °C 30 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
28 Aug 21.8 °C 30 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
29 Aug 22.5 °C 30 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
30 Aug 20.5 °C 59 % 30 km/h 1.1 mm Low 8
31 Aug 21.3 °C 58 % 22 km/h 1.9 mm Very low 4
1 Sept 20.0 °C 53 % 20 km/h 0.8 mm Very low 4
2 Sept 18.2 °C 48 % 21 km/h 0.1 mm Low 8
3 Sept 24.3 °C 35 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
4 Sept 23.0 °C 44 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
5 Sept 21.2 °C 47 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
6 Sept 16.4 °C 67 % 25 km/h 0.2 mm Moderate 12
7 Sept 12.9 °C 61 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 13
8 Sept 12.6 °C 59 % 18 km/h 0.0 mm Low 10
9 Sept 17.2 °C 41 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 14
10 Sept 18.4 °C 35 % 41 km/h 1.4 mm Low 10
11 Sept 16.0 °C 64 % 17 km/h 0.3 mm Low 9
12 Sept 17.3 °C 56 % 18 km/h 1.1 mm Low 6
13 Sept 20.3 °C 70 % 35 km/h 3.1 mm Very low 3
14 Sept 15.5 °C 44 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Low 6
15 Sept 16.1 °C 40 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Low 10
16 Sept 14.4 °C 50 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Low 10
17 Sept 15.6 °C 45 % 14 km/h 0.0 mm Low 10
18 Sept 16.3 °C 33 % 16 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 14
19 Sept 16.1 °C 33 % 13 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 15
20 Sept 16.1 °C 34 % 18 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
21 Sept 16.4 °C 39 % 14 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
22 Sept 15.9 °C 41 % 13 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
23 Sept 15.4 °C 34 % 18 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
24 Sept 13.0 °C 47 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
25 Sept 11.8 °C 54 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
26 Sept 15.6 °C 45 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
27 Sept after 16.6 °C 67 % 31 km/h 7.0 mm Very low 0

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 7 Aug 2020
After · 3 Oct 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.

Detections table · 12,757Every 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 Gorny Ulus fire last?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 14 August 2020 to 26 September 2020 (44 days). The perimeter dates it from 19 August 2020 to 26 September 2020.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 68,036 hectares (680.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Gorny Ulus (42,482 ha, 0.9 %); Khangalassky Ulus (24,423 ha, 1.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 24.3 °C, humidity dropped to 30 % and gusts hit 41 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 23, 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 · Emergency number and official warnings ›

Satellite cross-check

History of this page · 1 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
  1. Start date: 19 August 2020 → 14 August 2020.

RSS Changes to this page

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 112.

How we know this
  • Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery; 3 polygons grouped in this page.
  • Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 19 August 2020 to 26 September 2020. 12,757 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.

How we build fire pages: methodology ›

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.