How long did the Kyustendil fire last?

Copernicus dates it between 2 August 2021 and 3 August 2021: 2 days between the first and last image with fire.

How much area did it burn?

The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 151 hectares (1.5 km²). Official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire only entered Kyustendil (151 ha, 0.2 %).

Did the fire reach a town?

The fire started in Kyustendil and came within 15.3 km of its centre. That is the distance from the perimeter, or the nearest hotspot, to the point marking the centre; it does not mean it entered the houses.

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 34.9 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 52 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 35, class High.

Where does this data come from?

From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Bulgaria (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

BG · Bulgaria · 2021-08-02 → 2021-08-03

Kyustendil fire, 2 August 2021 Кюстендил · Kyustendil

Out · last detection 3 Aug 2021, 10:51 UTC

The fire started on 2 August 2021 in Kyustendil, Bulgaria, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 151 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.

Number 8 in Bulgaria in 2021, of 13.

The power measured by the satellite is low (8.2 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Bosilegrad Municipality · 2019 Bosilegrad Municipality · 2024 Bosilegrad Municipality · 2024 Trgoviste Municipality · 2019

Burnt area: 151ha; Copernicus perimeter
Duration: 2days; 2 Aug 2021 – 3 Aug 2021
Municipalities hit: 1; municipalities
Started on: 2 Aug; 2021
Heat detections: 4; in a single hotspot: 8 MW
Danger at start: 35; High · FWI index
Average daily power: 6MW; detected power per day, on average

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 2 Aug3 Aug

Play back 3 Aug 2021

How it evolved, day by day

2 Aug 3 Aug

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

The weather it burned in

35°high

52km/h · peak gust

18%lowest humidity

It had gone one day without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.7 mm on 5 Aug.

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

Kyustendil Кюстендил 656 inhabitants · 15.3 km from the centre where it started

151 ha reached on 2 Aug

0.2 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the official 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.

What burned

Agricultural areas49 %
Other natural land36 %
Coniferous forest13 %
Scrub and transitional woodland2.6 %

Natura 2000 protected area affected: 2 %

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)
2 Aug	34.9 °C	18 %	52 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
3 Aug	31.7 °C	28 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	High 26
4 Aug after	32.9 °C	25 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	High 27
5 Aug after	33.5 °C	25 %	66 km/h	1.7 mm	High 25

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 26 Jul 2021

After · 10 Aug 2021

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 2 August 2021 the air beside the fire reached 22 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 19: 1.3 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak22 µg/m³

Days over the guideline4 days

PM1053 µg/m³

WHO 15

31123456

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 · 4Every 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

All fires in Bulgaria ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Kyustendil fire last?: Copernicus dates it between 2 August 2021 and 3 August 2021: 2 days between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?: The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 151 hectares (1.5 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire only entered Kyustendil (151 ha, 0.2 %).
Did the fire reach a town?: The fire started in Kyustendil and came within 15.3 km of its centre. That is the distance from the perimeter, or the nearest hotspot, to the point marking the centre; it does not mean it entered the houses.
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 34.9 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 52 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 35, class High.
Where does this data come from?: From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Bulgaria (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 ›

ГДПБЗН · Пожарна безопасност и защита на населението ↗

Satellite cross-check

NASA FIRMS ↗
EFFIS · Copernicus ↗

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

No changes since 24 October 2026.

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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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What really happened?

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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.

How we know this

Perimeter: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 4 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.

How we build fire pages: methodology ›

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 (Public Domain). 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.

Where it burned