How long did the Irbitsky District fire last?

According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 4 May 2023 to 21 May 2023 (18 days). The perimeter dates it from 4 May 2023 to 15 May 2023.

How much area did it burn?

The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 11,643 hectares (116.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 3 municipalities: Irbitsky District (7,421 ha, 1.6 %); Артёмовский городской окру (3,871 ha, 1.9 %); городской округ Сухой Лог (235 ha, 0.1 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 26.6 °C, humidity dropped to 3 % and gusts hit 73 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 47, class Very 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.

RU · Russia · 2023-05-04 → 2023-05-21

Irbitsky District fire, 4 May 2023 Irbitsky District, Артёмовский городской окру, городской округ Сухой Лог

Out · last detection 21 May 2023, 09:14 UTC

The fire started on 4 May 2023 in Irbitsky District, Russia, and satellites saw it burning for 18 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 11,643 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.

It is the 5th largest in Sverdlovsk Oblast since 2016 (of 29 with a page). Number 80 in Russia in 2023, of 450.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Артёмовский городской окру · 2023

Burnt area: 11,643ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 18days; 4 May 2023 – 21 May 2023
Municipalities hit: 3; districts
Started on: 4 May; 2023
Heat detections: 983; in a single hotspot: 251 MW
Danger at start: 32; High · FWI index
Average daily power: 475MW; detected power per day, on average

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 4 May21 May

Play back 21 May 2023

How it evolved, day by day

4 May 6 May 7 May 10 May 13 May 16 May 19 May

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

The weather it burned in

27°high

73km/h · peak gust

3%lowest humidity

It had gone 3 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.

How big is it?

It burned the equivalent of 7.4% of the area of London (116 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

Irbitsky District where it started

7,421 ha reached on 4 May

1.6 %
Артёмовский городской окру

3,871 ha reached on 5 May

1.9 %
городской округ Сухой Лог

235 ha reached on 12 May

0.1 %

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 2025

Built-up area< 0.1 ha

Residents< 20

Inside the perimeter there was no noticeable built-up land and almost nobody lived there (GHSL 2025, 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. The GHSL 2025 epoch is a projection made from 2020 and earlier data.

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)
4 May	26.6 °C	7 %	49 km/h	0.0 mm	High 32
5 May	24.3 °C	12 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	High 30
6 May	26.4 °C	4 %	47 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38
7 May	25.1 °C	14 %	73 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 47
8 May	12.1 °C	19 %	50 km/h	0.0 mm	High 32
9 May	13.4 °C	7 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	High 25
10 May	17.9 °C	6 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	High 28
11 May	14.8 °C	20 %	37 km/h	0.3 mm	High 28
12 May	17.1 °C	17 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	High 27
13 May	16.3 °C	16 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	High 28
14 May	16.1 °C	42 %	34 km/h	0.3 mm	Moderate 21
15 May	20.7 °C	19 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	High 23
16 May	22.2 °C	21 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	High 26
17 May	20.3 °C	11 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	High 30
18 May	19.8 °C	16 %	42 km/h	0.0 mm	High 33
19 May	20.4 °C	11 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
20 May	24.3 °C	9 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	High 32
21 May	25.9 °C	3 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38
22 May after	27.4 °C	8 %	16 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
23 May after	28.7 °C	11 %	21 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 41
24 May after	29.5 °C	13 %	25 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
25 May after	28.9 °C	21 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
26 May after	28.3 °C	26 %	25 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
27 May after	30.0 °C	25 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
28 May after	31.3 °C	25 %	23 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
29 May after	33.3 °C	12 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
30 May after	27.3 °C	20 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
31 May after	30.1 °C	29 %	52 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 27 Apr 2023

After · 28 May 2023

Before After

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 11 May 2023 the air beside the fire reached 111 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 53: 3.5 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak111 µg/m³

Days over the guideline9 days

PM10159 µg/m³

Optical depth1.23

WHO 15

23456789101112131415161718

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 · 983Every 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 time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

24,733 haАртёмовский городской окруMay 2023 · 20 days · 20 km away

All fires in Russia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Irbitsky District fire last?: According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 4 May 2023 to 21 May 2023 (18 days). The perimeter dates it from 4 May 2023 to 15 May 2023.
How much area did it burn?: The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 11,643 hectares (116.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 3 municipalities: Irbitsky District (7,421 ha, 1.6 %); Артёмовский городской окру (3,871 ha, 1.9 %); городской округ Сухой Лог (235 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 26.6 °C, humidity dropped to 3 % and gusts hit 73 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 47, class Very 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

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · Copernicus ↗

History of this page · 1 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.

25 October 2026 Last day with fire: 15 May 2023 → 21 May 2023.

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?

Dates or duration Place or towns Burned area Name It was not a wildfire Same fire as another page Something else

What really happened?

Your connection to the fire (optional) Email (optional)

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.
Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 4 May 2023 to 15 May 2023. 983 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 2025, 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.

Where it burned