Homs fire, May 2019 Homs
The fire started on 23 May 2019 in Homs, Syria, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 199 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 21th largest in Homs since 2016 (of 34 with a page). Number 100 in Syria in 2019, of 163.
The power measured by the satellite is low (0.9 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
- 199ha
- Copernicus perimeter
- Duration
- 1day
- 23 May 2019 – 23 May 2019
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- subdistricts
- Started on
- 23 May
- 2019
- Heat detections
- 1
- in a single hotspot: 1 MW
- Danger at start
- 74
- Very extreme · FWI index
- Energy released
- 1MW
- sum of detected power
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone 19 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
-
Homs where it started199 ha reached on 23 May0.3 %
Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the official 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.
What burned
- Agricultural areas91 %
- Artificial surfaces7.1 %
- Other natural land1.5 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 23 May | 40.3 °C | 5 % | 47 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 74 |
| 24 May after | 40.7 °C | 8 % | 50 km/h | 0.2 mm | Very extreme 75 |
| 25 May after | 31.1 °C | 27 % | 58 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 59 |
| 26 May after | 30.5 °C | 22 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 51 |
| 27 May after | 35.2 °C | 14 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 28 May after | 38.4 °C | 14 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 29 May after | 39.2 °C | 11 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 62 |
| 30 May after | 40.9 °C | 11 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 66 |
| 31 May after | 39.9 °C | 11 % | 48 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 69 |
| 1 Jun after | 38.8 °C | 16 % | 50 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 67 |
| 2 Jun after | 36.1 °C | 21 % | 49 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 65 |
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.
Detections table · 1Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Homs fire last?
- Copernicus dates it between 23 May 2019 and 23 May 2019: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 199 hectares (2.0 km²). Official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Homs (199 ha, 0.3 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 40.3 °C, humidity dropped to 5 % and gusts hit 47 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 74, class Very extreme.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Syria (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.
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 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 ADM3 (Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY 3.0 IGO)). 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.