Li fire, 12 March 2017 ลี้ · Li, Sam Ngao
The fire started on 12 March 2017 in Li, Thailand, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 1,254 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.
It is the 301th largest in Chiang Mai Province since 2016 (of 449 with a page). Number 142 in Thailand in 2017, of 218.
The power measured by the satellite is low (17.0 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: Li · 2016Li · 2026Mae Phrik · 2019Mae Phrik · 2024
- Burnt area
- 1,254ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 5days
- 12 Mar 2017 – 16 Mar 2017
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- districts
- Started on
- 12 Mar
- 2017
- Heat detections
- 36
- in a single hotspot: 17 MW
- Danger at start
- 26
- High · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 38MW
- 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 48 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
23% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 289 ha in 2016.
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Bangkok boundary: geoBoundaries · OpenStreetMap, Wambacher · © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL 1.0).
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).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
1,259 ha0.7 %
-
Sam Ngao สามเงา0 ha0.0 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2 Mar | 31.8 °C | 36 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 3 Mar | 33.9 °C | 30 % | 20 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 4 Mar | 33.5 °C | 31 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 5 Mar | 33.8 °C | 26 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 6 Mar | 34.0 °C | 28 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 7 Mar | 33.9 °C | 24 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 8 Mar | 34.4 °C | 28 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 9 Mar | 32.2 °C | 35 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 10 Mar | 33.0 °C | 38 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 11 Mar | 34.5 °C | 34 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 12 Mar | 34.8 °C | 29 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 13 Mar | 35.1 °C | 21 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 14 Mar | 34.7 °C | 29 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 35 |
| 15 Mar | 35.2 °C | 18 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 38 |
| 16 Mar | 35.3 °C | 24 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 17 Mar after | 33.7 °C | 30 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 18 Mar after | 34.0 °C | 28 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 38 |
| 19 Mar after | 34.2 °C | 27 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 20 Mar after | 34.6 °C | 23 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 38 |
| 21 Mar after | 33.6 °C | 29 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 38 |
| 22 Mar after | 34.6 °C | 26 % | 19 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 23 Mar after | 35.5 °C | 28 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 24 Mar after | 35.7 °C | 30 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 25 Mar after | 35.2 °C | 29 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 26 Mar after | 37.2 °C | 22 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 38 |
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.
Detections table · 36Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 20,120 haLi ลี้23 March 2026 · 33 days · 20 km away
- 21,139 haMae Phrik แม่พริก6 February 2019 · 33 days · 22 km away
- 12,196 haMae Phrik แม่พริก1 March 2024 · 19 days · 24 km away
- 28,586 haLi ลี้20 March 2026 · 24 days · 25 km away
- 18,226 haMae Phrik แม่พริก13 March 2025 · 19 days · 25 km away
- 45,311 haMae Phrik แม่พริก21 March 2026 · 35 days · 27 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Li fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 12 March 2017 and 16 March 2017: 5 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 1,254 hectares (12.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Li (1,259 ha, 0.7 %); Sam Ngao (0 ha, 0.0 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 35.3 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 42 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 41, class Very high.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Thailand (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: 199 · 191
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
How we know this
- Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery.
- Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 36 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.
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 (Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY 3.0 IGO)). 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.