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Hsipaw fire, 16 January 2026 Hsipaw, Mongkaing

Out · last detection 9 Feb 2026, 06:31 UTC

The fire started on 16 January 2026 in Hsipaw, Myanmar (Burma), and satellites saw it burning for 24 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 11,940 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 36th largest in Shan since 2016 (of 723 with a page). Number 32 in Myanmar (Burma) in 2026, of 418.

Burnt area
11,940ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
24days
16 Jan 2026 – 8 Feb 2026
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
16 Jan
2026
Heat detections
302
in a single hotspot: 70 MW
Danger at start
17
Moderate · FWI index
Energy released
1.7GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

9 Feb 2026
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 16 Jan8 Feb

How it evolved, day by day

1617181920212223242526272829303113456789

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

The weather it burned in

30°high
32km/h · peak gust
29%lowest humidity

It had gone 58 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

71% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 653 ha in 2019, 4,687 ha in 2020, 4,558 ha in 2021, 3,949 ha in 2023, 1,718 ha in 2024, 1,354 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 8,523 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Hsipaw where it started
    8,668 ha reached on 16 Jan
    1.6 %
  2. Mongkaing
    3,317 ha reached on 17 Jan
    0.9 %

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)
16 Jan 25.1 °C 50 % 29 km/h 0.2 mm Moderate 17
17 Jan 26.8 °C 37 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
18 Jan 27.3 °C 39 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
19 Jan 27.5 °C 38 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19
20 Jan 27.3 °C 34 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19
21 Jan 27.8 °C 33 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
22 Jan 27.8 °C 29 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
23 Jan 27.4 °C 35 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
24 Jan 27.1 °C 36 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
25 Jan 27.0 °C 39 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
26 Jan 26.7 °C 42 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 21
27 Jan 27.9 °C 38 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 21
28 Jan 28.4 °C 39 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
29 Jan 27.6 °C 34 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
30 Jan 27.7 °C 38 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
31 Jan 28.5 °C 36 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
1 Feb 28.7 °C 34 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
2 Feb 28.6 °C 39 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
3 Feb 28.8 °C 42 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
4 Feb 28.2 °C 36 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
5 Feb 28.5 °C 41 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
6 Feb 28.2 °C 35 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
7 Feb 29.3 °C 29 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
8 Feb 30.5 °C 32 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
9 Feb after 29.8 °C 27 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
10 Feb after 29.6 °C 34 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
11 Feb after 29.9 °C 34 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
12 Feb after 30.2 °C 25 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
13 Feb after 30.6 °C 24 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
14 Feb after 31.0 °C 23 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
15 Feb after 31.3 °C 25 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
16 Feb after 31.1 °C 22 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
17 Feb after 31.9 °C 25 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
18 Feb after 32.6 °C 26 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 34

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 9 Jan 2026
After · 15 Feb 2026

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 26 January 2026 the air beside the fire reached 44 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 28: 1.9 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak44 µg/m³
Days over the guideline21 days
PM1045 µg/m³
Optical depth0.54
1415161718192021222324252627282930311234567891011
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 · 302Every 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 Myanmar (Burma) ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Hsipaw fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 16 January 2026 and 8 February 2026: 24 days between the first and last heat detection of the perimeter.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 11,940 hectares (119.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Hsipaw (8,668 ha, 1.6 %); Mongkaing (3,317 ha, 0.9 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 30.5 °C, humidity dropped to 29 % and gusts hit 32 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 27, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Myanmar (Burma) (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.

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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 (Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 (CC BY 4.0)). 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.