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UA · Ukraine · –

Lutuhyne fire, 30 August 2023 Лутугинський район · Lutuhyne

Out · last detection 6 Sept 2023, 08:48 UTC

The fire started on 30 August 2023 in Lutuhyne, Ukraine, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 981 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 73th largest in Luhansk Oblast since 2016 (of 909 with a page). Number 36 in Ukraine in 2023, of 491.

The power measured by the satellite is low (12.3 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
981ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
8days
30 Aug 2023 – 6 Sept 2023
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
30 Aug
2023
Heat detections
14
in a single hotspot: 12 MW
Danger at start
28
High · FWI index
Average daily power
17MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 30 Aug6 Sept
6 Sept 2023

How it evolved, day by day

30 Aug 2023 · 27 MW · 6 31 Aug 2023 · 16 MW · 3 1 Sept 2023 · 34 MW · 3 2 Sept 2023 · 4 MW · 1 6 Sept 2023 · 6 MW · 1
30 Aug 31 Aug 1 Sept 2 Sept 6 Sept

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

The weather it burned in

31°high
40km/h · peak gust
17%lowest humidity

It had gone 17 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 18.2 mm on 15 Sept.

This area had burned before

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

How big is it?

10 km
It burned the equivalent of 0.6% of the area of London (9.8 km² against 1,583 km²).

London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).

This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.

What happened to each town

  1. Lutuhyne Лутугинський район 65,908 inhabitants · 14.8 km from the centre where it started
    980 ha reached on 30 Aug
    0.9 %

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

  • Other natural land64 %
  • Agricultural areas34 %
  • Mixed forest2.0 %

Land cover inside the perimeter as reported by Copernicus EFFIS (outside the Corine Land Cover area).

People and buildings inside the perimeter

GHSL 2025
Built-up area< 0.1 ha
Residents< 20

Inside the perimeter there was no noticeable built-up land and almost nobody lived there (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)
30 Aug 26.0 °C 24 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
31 Aug 30.1 °C 17 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
1 Sept 30.7 °C 27 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
2 Sept 25.6 °C 56 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
3 Sept 27.2 °C 40 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
4 Sept 25.4 °C 45 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
5 Sept 20.7 °C 54 % 31 km/h 3.7 mm Very low 5
6 Sept 26.0 °C 35 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 12
7 Sept after 23.6 °C 30 % 41 km/h 0.3 mm High 26
8 Sept after 19.8 °C 32 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
9 Sept after 14.9 °C 45 % 49 km/h 0.2 mm High 28
10 Sept after 19.5 °C 46 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
11 Sept after 20.3 °C 48 % 33 km/h 0.5 mm Moderate 21
12 Sept after 20.8 °C 40 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
13 Sept after 20.1 °C 39 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19
14 Sept after 21.5 °C 31 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 21
15 Sept after 19.7 °C 44 % 27 km/h 18.2 mm Very low 1

Its twins: fires that started in the same weather

It started with an FWI of 27.9, a minimum humidity of 24% and 17 days without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2016: 66.

FWI at the start 27.9
Minimum humidity 24 %
Days without rain 17
this fire chosen twins rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar

Outlines of the closest twins

Kreminna fire, May 2022
158 ha 5 days FWI 28.1 Min. humidity 25 % 84 km away, in 2022

First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 7.3 mm on 14 May.

What happened to them

3 days
median duration
206 ha
median area
3 %
went past 1,000 ha
3.0 mm
rain at the end (median; 60 of 66 had it)

It was 4.8 times larger than the median of its twins and lasted 8 days, against 3 days.

Only 2 of its 66 twins burned more. The weather on the first day does not explain everything: the wind in the following days, the fuel and the firefighting also count. In 6 of 66, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 3.0 mm.

This is a bank of analogues: it shows what usually happens, not what will happen. With fewer than 15 twins we give no figures. How we calculate it

How it ended

18.2 mmfirst rain
15 Sept9 days after it ended
40km/h · max. gust

It was considered over on 6 Sept, and on 15 Sept 18.2 mm fell. We do not know whether the rain or the firefighters put it out. Twins with rain when they ended: 60 of 66, with a median of 3.0 mm.

Weather on this page: Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)

How a twin is chosen

  • Same area: fires that have already ended, less than 250 km from this one, since 2016.
  • Same start: we compare the FWI on the first day, the minimum humidity that day and the run of days without rain before it. The slider sets how much they may differ.
  • Only pages with final weather data (ERA5 reanalysis) calculated in the same way as this fire’s; agricultural and grass burns and pages with data under review are left out.
  • Fires burning at the same time as this one (a week before or after) are left out: they share the same spell of weather and do not count as a precedent.
  • They are sorted by similarity, and the outlines of the first five are drawn.

How we calculate it

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 23 Aug 2023
After · 13 Sept 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 28 August 2023 the air beside the fire reached 22 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak22 µg/m³
Days over the guideline0 days
PM1027 µg/m³
Optical depth0.91
28 Aug31 Aug3 Sept6 Sept9 Sept
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 · 14Every 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 Ukraine

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Lutuhyne fire last?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 30 August 2023 to 6 September 2023 (8 days). The perimeter dates it from 30 August 2023 to 31 August 2023.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 981 hectares (9.8 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Lutuhyne (980 ha, 0.9 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The fire started in Lutuhyne and came within 14.8 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 30.7 °C, humidity dropped to 17 % and gusts hit 40 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 37, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Ukraine (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.
How did the fires that started in similar weather in this area end?
Fires less than 250 km away that started since 2016 with a similar FWI, humidity and dry spell: 66. Their median duration was 3 days and their median area 206 ha; 3 % went past 1,000 ha. Only 2 of its 66 twins burned more. The weather on the first day does not explain everything: the wind in the following days, the fuel and the firefighting also count. In 6 of 66, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 3.0 mm.

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: 101 · 112 · Emergency number and official warnings

Satellite cross-check

History of this page Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night 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
What do you think is wrong?

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 101 · 112.

How we know this
  • Perimeter: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
  • Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 30 August 2023 to 31 August 2023. 14 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.

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.