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Kahta fire, July 2019 Kâhta · Samsat, Kahta

Out · last detection 21 Jul 2019, 23:59 UTC

The fire started on 21 July 2019 in Kahta, Türkiye, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 311 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 12th largest in Adıyaman since 2016 (of 40 with a page). Number 38 in Türkiye in 2019, of 138.

The power measured by the satellite is low (5.6 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
311ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
1day
21 Jul 2019 – 21 Jul 2019
Municipalities hit
2
districts
Started on
21 Jul
2019
Heat detections
13
in a single hotspot: 6 MW
Danger at start
51
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
45MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 21 Jul21 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

21

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

The weather it burned in

40°high
31km/h · peak gust
15%lowest humidity

It had gone 40 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

  1. Samsat 7,893 inhabitants · 8.5 km from the town
    168 ha reached on 21 Jul
    0.5 %
  2. Kahta Kâhta 122,774 inhabitants · 14.8 km from the town where it started
    143 ha reached on 21 Jul
    0.1 %

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 areas92 %
  • Other natural land8.3 %

Land cover inside the perimeter according to Corine Land Cover, as reported by Copernicus.

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)
21 Jul 40.1 °C 15 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
22 Jul after 38.5 °C 19 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
23 Jul after 38.2 °C 20 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
24 Jul after 35.8 °C 25 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
25 Jul after 36.7 °C 20 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
26 Jul after 36.9 °C 14 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
27 Jul after 38.3 °C 14 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
28 Jul after 39.3 °C 9 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
29 Jul after 38.3 °C 13 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
30 Jul after 38.4 °C 18 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
31 Jul after 39.0 °C 21 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 14 Jul 2019
After · 28 Jul 2019

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 · 13Every 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 Türkiye ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Kahta fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 21 July 2019 and 21 July 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 311 hectares (3.1 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Samsat (168 ha, 0.5 %); Kahta (143 ha, 0.1 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 8.5 km of Samsat. That is the distance to the perimeter or nearest hotspot; it does not mean it entered the houses.
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 40.1 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 31 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 51, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Türkiye (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.

Report an error
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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 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 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 slightly from each country’s official figure.