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Khobi fire, 14 January 2023 Khobi

Out · last detection 14 Jan 2023, 10:32 UTC

The fire started on 14 January 2023 in Khobi, Georgia, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 422 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 19th largest in Samegrelo-Zemo Svaneti since 2016 (of 26 with a page). Number 6 in Georgia in 2023, of 13.

The power measured by the satellite is low (18.3 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
422ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
1day
14 Jan 2023 – 14 Jan 2023
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
14 Jan
2023
Heat detections
24
in a single hotspot: 18 MW
Danger at start
3
Very low · FWI index
Energy released
163MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 14 Jan14 Jan

How it evolved, day by day

14

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

The weather it burned in

10°high
57km/h · peak gust
45%lowest humidity

It had gone 5 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

85% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 14 ha in 2016, 503 ha in 2017, 38 ha in 2019, 256 ha in 2021. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 360 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Khobi where it started
    422 ha reached on 13 Jan
    0.6 %

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)
14 Jan 10.4 °C 45 % 57 km/h 0.0 mm Very low 3
15 Jan after 11.8 °C 46 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very low 2
16 Jan after 12.6 °C 49 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very low 2
17 Jan after 14.0 °C 45 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very low 3
18 Jan after 14.5 °C 47 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very low 3
19 Jan after 15.6 °C 51 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very low 3
20 Jan after 17.1 °C 32 % 60 km/h 0.0 mm Low 8
21 Jan after 15.7 °C 34 % 62 km/h 0.0 mm Low 9
22 Jan after 13.5 °C 35 % 59 km/h 0.0 mm Low 8
23 Jan after 13.6 °C 33 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Low 8
24 Jan after 13.2 °C 37 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Low 5

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 7 Jan 2023
After · 21 Jan 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 15 January 2023 the air beside the fire reached 77 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 26: 1.7 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak77 µg/m³
Days over the guideline1 day
PM1041 µg/m³
Optical depth0.23
121314151617
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 · 24Every 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 Georgia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Khobi fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 14 January 2023 and 14 January 2023: 1 day 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 422 hectares (4.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Khobi (422 ha, 0.6 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 10.4 °C, humidity dropped to 45 % and gusts hit 57 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 3, class Very low.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Georgia (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 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 (Public Domain). 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.