How long did the Lukovit fire last?

Copernicus dates it between 28 September 2019 and 28 September 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 167 hectares (1.7 km²). Official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire only entered Lukovit (167 ha, 0.4 %).

Did the fire reach a town?

The closest fire to a town centre came within 3.5 km of Lukovit. 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 26.6 °C, humidity dropped to 36 % and gusts hit 15 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 11, class Low.

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 · 2019-09-28 → 2019-09-28

Lukovit fire, 28 September 2019 Луковит · Lukovit

Out · last detection 28 Sept 2019, 11:48 UTC

The fire started on 28 September 2019 in Lukovit, Bulgaria, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 167 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 31th largest in Lovech since 2016 (of 52 with a page). Number 23 in Bulgaria in 2019, of 42.

The power measured by the satellite is low (27.9 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: Cherven Bryag · 2019 Cherven Bryag · 2016 Cherven Bryag · 2026 Cherven Bryag · 2024

Burnt area: 167ha; Copernicus perimeter
Duration: 1day; 28 Sept 2019 – 28 Sept 2019
Municipalities hit: 1; municipalities
Started on: 28 Sept; 2019
Heat detections: 13; in a single hotspot: 28 MW
Danger at start: 11; Low · FWI index
Average daily power: 156MW; detected power per day, on average

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 28 Sept28 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

28 Sept 2019 · 156 MW · 13

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

The weather it burned in

27°high

15km/h · peak gust

36%lowest humidity

It had gone one day without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 10.9 mm on 3 Oct.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

Lukovit Луковит 15,128 inhabitants · 3.5 km from the town where it started

167 ha reached on 28 Sept

0.4 %

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 areas79 %
Scrub and transitional woodland20 %
Broadleaved forest0.6 %

Natura 2000 protected area affected: 100 %

LIC Karlukovo BG0001014
ZEPA Karlukovski karst BG0000332

Natura 2000 sites (European Environment Agency, 2024 release) crossed by the perimeter.

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)
28 Sept	26.6 °C	36 %	15 km/h	0.0 mm	Low 11
29 Sept after	28.1 °C	39 %	20 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 14
30 Sept after	29.1 °C	35 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 17
1 Oct after	28.3 °C	31 %	23 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 18
2 Oct after	29.8 °C	33 %	21 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 18
3 Oct after	26.8 °C	43 %	34 km/h	10.9 mm	Very low 2

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 21 Sept 2019

After · 5 Oct 2019

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 29 September 2019 the air beside the fire reached 20 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak20 µg/m³

Days over the guideline0 days

PM1029 µg/m³

WHO 15

26272829301

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 · 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 time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Bulgaria ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Lukovit fire last?: Copernicus dates it between 28 September 2019 and 28 September 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 167 hectares (1.7 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire only entered Lukovit (167 ha, 0.4 %).
Did the fire reach a town?: The closest fire to a town centre came within 3.5 km of Lukovit. 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 26.6 °C, humidity dropped to 36 % and gusts hit 15 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 11, class Low.
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

ГДПБЗН · Пожарна безопасност и защита на населението ↗

Satellite cross-check

NASA FIRMS ↗
EFFIS · Copernicus ↗

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

What do you think is wrong?

Dates or duration Place or towns Burned area Name It was not a wildfire Same fire as another page Something else

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. 13 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