Hoon fire, 23 March 2024 Hoon
The fire started on 23 March 2024 in Hoon, Laos, and satellites saw it burning for 20 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 7,596 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 30th largest in Oudomxay since 2016 (of 241 with a page). Number 6 in Laos in 2024, of 109.
- Burnt area
- 7,596ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 20days
- 23 Mar 2024 – 11 Apr 2024
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- districts
- Started on
- 23 Mar
- 2024
- Heat detections
- 443
- in a single hotspot: 195 MW
- Danger at start
- 9
- Low · FWI index
- Energy released
- 7.5GW
- 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 0 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 2.2 mm on 15 Apr.
This area had burned before
88% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,672 ha in 2016, 2,417 ha in 2017, 2,155 ha in 2018, 2,992 ha in 2019, 3,101 ha in 2020, 1,671 ha in 2021, 867 ha in 2022, 2,604 ha in 2023. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 6,714 ha that had burned before.
- 2,124 ha Hoon fire, March 2020 9,258 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,549 ha Hoon fire, February 2021 3,050 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,375 ha Hoon fire, March 2016 4,558 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,373 ha Hoon fire, February 2019 2,021 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,367 ha Hoon fire, February 2023 2,858 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 887 ha Hoon fire, March 2017 2,665 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 784 ha Hoon fire, March 2017 3,023 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 775 ha Hoon fire, February 2023 2,626 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Hoon where it started7,630 ha reached on 23 Mar3.6 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 23 Mar | 29.0 °C | 33 % | 41 km/h | 0.1 mm | Low 9 |
| 24 Mar | 30.3 °C | 25 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 19 |
| 25 Mar | 31.3 °C | 25 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 20 |
| 26 Mar | 30.4 °C | 31 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 27 Mar | 29.3 °C | 40 % | 40 km/h | 0.5 mm | Moderate 19 |
| 28 Mar | 29.5 °C | 33 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 20 |
| 29 Mar | 29.3 °C | 33 % | 45 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 22 |
| 30 Mar | 31.3 °C | 27 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 31 Mar | 31.8 °C | 29 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 1 Apr | 32.5 °C | 22 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 2 Apr | 32.6 °C | 24 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 3 Apr | 33.1 °C | 27 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 4 Apr | 34.0 °C | 27 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 5 Apr | 33.3 °C | 29 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 6 Apr | 34.1 °C | 32 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 7 Apr | 33.7 °C | 33 % | 35 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 30 |
| 8 Apr | 32.9 °C | 39 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 9 Apr | 31.4 °C | 47 % | 34 km/h | 1.6 mm | Moderate 11 |
| 10 Apr | 26.9 °C | 55 % | 27 km/h | 0.1 mm | Moderate 13 |
| 11 Apr | 30.8 °C | 43 % | 25 km/h | 0.3 mm | Moderate 18 |
| 12 Apr after | 30.8 °C | 46 % | 30 km/h | 0.2 mm | Moderate 18 |
| 13 Apr after | 33.0 °C | 34 % | 32 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 24 |
| 14 Apr after | 32.4 °C | 36 % | 34 km/h | 0.4 mm | High 25 |
| 15 Apr after | 30.6 °C | 43 % | 33 km/h | 2.2 mm | Low 9 |
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 5 April 2024 the air beside the fire reached 104 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 63: 4.2 times the WHO daily 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)
Detections table · 443Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 9,870 haHoon10 March 2023 · 26 days · 22 km away
- 13,326 haHoon8 April 2018 · 7 days · 24 km away
- 12,233 haPha Oudom28 March 2016 · 22 days · 29 km away
- 9,809 haHoon16 March 2023 · 22 days · 33 km away
- 14,815 haHoon22 March 2026 · 27 days · 37 km away
- 11,424 haPha Oudom21 March 2019 · 13 days · 40 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Hoon fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 23 March 2024 to 11 April 2024 (20 days). The perimeter dates it from 23 March 2024 to 4 April 2024.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 7,596 hectares (76.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Hoon (7,630 ha, 3.6 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 34.1 °C, humidity dropped to 22 % and gusts hit 45 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 30, class High.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Laos (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 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 (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 from each country’s official figure.