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UA · Ukraine ·

Henichesk fire, 14 August 2023 Генічеський район · Henichesk

Out · last detection 14 Aug 2023, 10:59 UTC

The fire started on 14 August 2023 in Henichesk, Ukraine, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 171 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 689th largest in Kherson Oblast since 2016 (of 1102 with a page). Number 274 in Ukraine in 2023, of 491.

The power measured by the satellite is low (19.7 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
171ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
1day
14 Aug 2023 – 14 Aug 2023
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
14 Aug
2023
Heat detections
5
in a single hotspot: 20 MW
Danger at start
8
Low · FWI index
Average daily power
62MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 14 Aug14 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

14 Aug 2023 · 62 MW · 5

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

The weather it burned in

28°high
27km/h · peak gust
58%lowest humidity

It had gone 2 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Henichesk Генічеський район 59,491 inhabitants · 37.6 km from the centre where it started
    167 ha reached on 14 Aug
    0.1 %

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

  • Agricultural areas54 %
  • Other natural land46 %

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

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 27.7 °C 58 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Low 8
15 Aug after 27.9 °C 62 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Low 11
16 Aug after 29.7 °C 56 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 13
17 Aug after 28.7 °C 62 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 13
18 Aug after 28.7 °C 55 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 12
19 Aug after 30.5 °C 55 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 12
20 Aug after 31.8 °C 58 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 14
21 Aug after 33.9 °C 39 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
22 Aug after 31.4 °C 54 % 26 km/h 0.1 mm Moderate 17
23 Aug after 28.7 °C 44 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19
24 Aug after 27.8 °C 47 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18

Its twins: fires that started in the same weather

It started with an FWI of 8.3, a minimum humidity of 58% and 2 days without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2022: 23.

FWI at the start 8.3
Minimum humidity 58 %
Days without rain 2
this fire chosen twins rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar

Outlines of the closest twins

Bilohirsk fire, November 2023
256 ha 1 day FWI 8.2 Min. humidity 58 % 97 km away, in 2023

First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 7.2 mm on 9 Nov.

What happened to them

2 days
median duration
178 ha
median area
4 %
went past 1,000 ha
3.7 mm
rain at the end (median; 20 of 23 had it)

It burned an area similar to its twins (171 ha against a median of 178 ha) and lasted 1 day, against 2 days.

In 3 of 23, 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 3.7 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

—first rain
—no rain in ten days
27km/h · max. gust

It was considered over on 14 Aug, and not even 1 mm fell in the following ten days: it went out without rain. Twins with rain when they ended: 20 of 23, with a median of 3.7 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 2022.
  • 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 · 7 Aug 2023
After · 21 Aug 2023

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 16 August 2023 the air beside the fire reached 15 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak15 µg/m³
Days over the guideline0 days
PM1019 µg/m³
Optical depth0.20
12 Aug14 Aug16 Aug
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 · 5Every 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 Ukraine

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Henichesk fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 14 August 2023 and 14 August 2023: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 171 hectares (1.7 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Henichesk (167 ha, 0.1 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The fire started in Henichesk and came within 37.6 km of its centre. That is the distance from the perimeter, or the nearest hotspot, to the point marking the centre; it does not mean it entered the houses.
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 27.7 °C, humidity dropped to 58 % and gusts hit 27 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 8, class Low.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Ukraine (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 2022 with a similar FWI, humidity and dry spell: 23. Their median duration was 2 days and their median area 178 ha; 4 % went past 1,000 ha. In 3 of 23, 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 3.7 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.

Emergency number: 101 · 112 · Emergency number and official warnings

Satellite cross-check

History of this page Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.

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 101 · 112.

How we know this
  • Perimeter: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
  • Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 5 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.

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 ADM2 (Public Domain). 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.