Lawksawk fire, 26 February 2025 Lawksawk, Hopong, Mongkaing
The fire started on 26 February 2025 in Lawksawk, Myanmar, and satellites saw it burning for 23 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 38,375 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.
It is the 5th largest in Shan since 2016 (of 806 with a page). The largest in Myanmar in 2025, of 135.
Compare with…
- Burnt area
- 38,375ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 23days
- 26 Feb 2025 – 20 Mar 2025
- Municipalities hit
- 3
- municipalities
- Started on
- 26 Feb
- 2025
- Heat detections
- 2,653
- in a single hotspot: 162 MW
- Danger at start
- 26
- High · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 873MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone 21 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
80% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 4,142 ha in 2016, 8,524 ha in 2017, 1,510 ha in 2018, 8,627 ha in 2019, 8,919 ha in 2020, 9,003 ha in 2021, 11,129 ha in 2022, 5,218 ha in 2023, 14,978 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 30,551 ha that had burned before.
- 6,039 ha Lawksawk fire, February 2024 36,894 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,416 ha Hopong fire, March 2024 5,373 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,353 ha Hopong fire, February 2021 4,250 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,559 ha Lawksawk fire, March 2017 3,542 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,151 ha Lawksawk fire, March 2021 3,025 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,038 ha Hopong fire, March 2020 6,726 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,655 ha Lawksawk fire, March 2024 2,621 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,627 ha Lawksawk fire, March 2021 2,390 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
Berlin boundary: geoBoundaries · Federal Agency for Cartography and Geodesy (dl-de/by-2-0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
Lawksawk where it started19,845 ha3.8 %
-
13,153 ha4.5 %
-
5,572 ha1.5 %
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 2025Inside the perimeter there were about 0.23 hectares of built-up land and about 150 residents (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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 20 Feb | 31.3 °C | 30 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 21 Feb | 30.2 °C | 34 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 22 Feb | 31.2 °C | 32 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 23 Feb | 31.9 °C | 30 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 24 Feb | 30.4 °C | 35 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 25 Feb | 30.3 °C | 41 % | 28 km/h | 0.9 mm | Moderate 19 |
| 26 Feb | 32.3 °C | 31 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 27 Feb | 32.4 °C | 27 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 28 Feb | 33.2 °C | 31 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 1 Mar | 32.8 °C | 28 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 2 Mar | 34.4 °C | 25 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 3 Mar | 33.8 °C | 24 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 4 Mar | 33.3 °C | 27 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 5 Mar | 32.9 °C | 26 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 6 Mar | 33.4 °C | 26 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 7 Mar | 34.3 °C | 20 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 38 |
| 8 Mar | 34.6 °C | 20 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 9 Mar | 33.4 °C | 28 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 10 Mar | 34.8 °C | 25 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 35 |
| 11 Mar | 34.5 °C | 25 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 12 Mar | 35.0 °C | 20 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 13 Mar | 34.5 °C | 21 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 14 Mar | 35.9 °C | 20 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 15 Mar | 35.8 °C | 22 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 16 Mar | 36.6 °C | 21 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 17 Mar | 36.8 °C | 22 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 18 Mar | 36.1 °C | 28 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 19 Mar | 35.4 °C | 29 % | 37 km/h | 0.1 mm | Very high 40 |
| 20 Mar | 34.5 °C | 29 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 21 Mar after | 31.7 °C | 40 % | 32 km/h | 5.3 mm | Low 6 |
| 22 Mar after | 31.8 °C | 47 % | 31 km/h | 0.7 mm | Moderate 13 |
| 23 Mar after | 33.1 °C | 37 % | 31 km/h | 0.3 mm | High 23 |
| 24 Mar after | 32.4 °C | 37 % | 26 km/h | 0.6 mm | High 22 |
| 25 Mar after | 32.2 °C | 37 % | 24 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 23 |
| 26 Mar after | 32.9 °C | 33 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 27 Mar after | 34.8 °C | 28 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 28 Mar after | 35.2 °C | 24 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 29 Mar after | 36.3 °C | 22 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 30 Mar after | 37.3 °C | 12 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 31 Mar after | 37.5 °C | 15 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 1 Apr after | 37.5 °C | 12 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 2 Apr after | 37.5 °C | 23 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 3 Apr after | 37.5 °C | 26 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 4 Apr after | 36.6 °C | 28 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 5 Apr after | 35.9 °C | 29 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 6 Apr after | 31.0 °C | 38 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
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 · CopernicusOn 10 March 2025 the air beside the fire reached 220 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 121: 8.0 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
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 · 2,653Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 17,068 haLawksawk1 March 2026 · 31 days · 4 km away
- 7,170 haMongkaing14 March 2026 · 14 days · 21 km away
- 6,966 haLawksawk15 March 2026 · 16 days · 21 km away
- 9,954 haYwangan8 March 2025 · 14 days · 32 km away
- 24,421 haLawksawk27 February 2026 · 14 days · 36 km away
- 36,894 haLawksawk26 February 2024 · 21 days · 39 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Lawksawk fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 26 February 2025 and 20 March 2025: 23 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 38,375 hectares (383.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 3 municipalities: Lawksawk (19,845 ha, 3.8 %); Hopong (13,153 ha, 4.5 %); Mongkaing (5,572 ha, 1.5 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 36.8 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 45 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 42, class Very high.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Myanmar (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.
Satellite cross-check
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.
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
How we know this
- Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery; 8 polygons grouped in this page.
- Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 2,653 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.
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 (Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 (CC BY 4.0)). 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.