How long did the Mae Ai fire last?

GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 13 April 2016 and 17 April 2016: 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 2,446 hectares (24.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 2 municipalities: Mae Ai (2,374 ha, 3.0 %); Mae Suai (84 ha, 0.1 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 39.4 °C, humidity dropped to 21 % and gusts hit 42 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 43, 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.

TH · Thailand · 2016-04-13 → 2016-04-17

Mae Ai fire, 13 April 2016 แม่อาย · Mae Ai, Mae Suai

Out · last detection 18 Apr 2016, 06:25 UTC

The fire started on 13 April 2016 in Mae Ai, Thailand, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,446 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 102th largest in Chiang Mai Province since 2016 (of 447 with a page). Number 83 in Thailand in 2016, of 486.

The power measured by the satellite is low (22.3 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: 2,446ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 5days; 13 Apr 2016 – 17 Apr 2016
Municipalities hit: 2; districts
Started on: 13 Apr; 2016
Heat detections: 79; in a single hotspot: 22 MW
Danger at start: 36; High · FWI index
Average daily power: 100MW; detected power per day, on average

Play back 18 Apr 2016

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 13 Apr17 Apr

How it evolved, day by day

13 Apr 14 Apr 15 Apr 16 Apr 17 Apr 18 Apr

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

The weather it burned in

39°high

42km/h · peak gust

21%lowest humidity

It had gone 36 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

Mae Ai แม่อาย where it started

2,374 ha reached on 13 Apr

3.0 %
Mae Suai แม่สรวย

84 ha reached on 13 Apr

0.1 %

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)
4 Apr	36.2 °C	26 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
5 Apr	37.4 °C	24 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
6 Apr	36.1 °C	33 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
7 Apr	37.0 °C	26 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	High 33
8 Apr	36.0 °C	32 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
9 Apr	36.3 °C	35 %	34 km/h	1.0 mm	High 26
10 Apr	37.7 °C	28 %	42 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
11 Apr	39.4 °C	22 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
12 Apr	38.1 °C	24 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
13 Apr	37.2 °C	26 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
14 Apr	38.5 °C	27 %	36 km/h	0.2 mm	Very high 40
15 Apr	38.9 °C	22 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
16 Apr	39.1 °C	21 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
17 Apr	38.9 °C	23 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 41
18 Apr after	38.5 °C	30 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
19 Apr after	37.9 °C	30 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
20 Apr after	38.9 °C	22 %	43 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
21 Apr after	38.6 °C	25 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
22 Apr after	35.6 °C	32 %	52 km/h	0.6 mm	High 36
23 Apr after	38.1 °C	29 %	44 km/h	0.0 mm	High 38
24 Apr after	37.4 °C	31 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
25 Apr after	36.3 °C	35 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
26 Apr after	38.0 °C	28 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
27 Apr after	39.7 °C	24 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 6 Apr 2016

After · 24 Apr 2016

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.

Detections table · 79Every 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 Thailand ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Mae Ai fire last?: GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 13 April 2016 and 17 April 2016: 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 2,446 hectares (24.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 2 municipalities: Mae Ai (2,374 ha, 3.0 %); Mae Suai (84 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 39.4 °C, humidity dropped to 21 % and gusts hit 42 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 43, 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

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · 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.

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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 199 · 191.

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.

Where it burned