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Jirang fire, April 2023 Jirang, Palasbari, Umling

Out · last measured on 11 Apr 2023

The fire started on 4 April 2023 in Jirang, India, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 7,681 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.

It is the 4th largest in Meghālaya since 2016 (of 13 with a page). Number 11 in India in 2023, of 23.

We have the GWIS perimeter for this fire, but the VIIRS sensors did not capture it in enough detail: no day-by-day evolution, but the split by municipality is there.

Burnt area
7,681ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
8days
4 Apr 2023 – 11 Apr 2023
Municipalities hit
3
subdistricts
Started on
4 Apr
2023
Danger at start
2
Very low · FWI index

Where it burned

The weather it burned in

34°high
45km/h · peak gust
24%lowest humidity

It had gone 0 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

90% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 4,753 ha in 2016, 3,718 ha in 2017, 3,192 ha in 2018, 3,316 ha in 2019, 4,873 ha in 2020, 4,936 ha in 2021, 3,072 ha in 2022. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 6,933 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Jirang where it started
    6,487 ha
    10 %
  2. Palasbari
    886 ha
    1.3 %
  3. Umling
    338 ha
    0.5 %

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)
4 Apr 25.0 °C 61 % 35 km/h 0.4 mm Very low 2
5 Apr 27.8 °C 55 % 33 km/h 0.2 mm Very low 5
6 Apr 29.2 °C 42 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Low 8
7 Apr 30.9 °C 33 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 12
8 Apr 31.7 °C 27 % 18 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 14
9 Apr 32.6 °C 30 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
10 Apr 33.8 °C 24 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
11 Apr 33.6 °C 24 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
12 Apr after 33.9 °C 20 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
13 Apr after 34.3 °C 26 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
14 Apr after 35.0 °C 26 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
15 Apr after 35.1 °C 29 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
16 Apr after 35.0 °C 33 % 36 km/h 0.1 mm High 27
17 Apr after 36.5 °C 29 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
18 Apr after 34.3 °C 41 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
19 Apr after 34.3 °C 39 % 44 km/h 0.4 mm High 28
20 Apr after 32.6 °C 43 % 34 km/h 0.5 mm High 24
21 Apr after 30.4 °C 51 % 35 km/h 0.3 mm Moderate 20

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 28 Mar 2023
After · 18 Apr 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 12 April 2023 the air beside the fire reached 99 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 54: 3.6 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak99 µg/m³
Days over the guideline13 days
PM10142 µg/m³
Optical depth1.08
234567891011121314
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)

Other fires nearby

All fires in India ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Jirang fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 4 April 2023 and 11 April 2023: 8 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 7,681 hectares (76.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 3 municipalities: Jirang (6,487 ha, 10 %); Palasbari (886 ha, 1.3 %); Umling (338 ha, 0.5 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 33.8 °C, humidity dropped to 24 % and gusts hit 45 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 25, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of India (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

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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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.

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 (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.