Malësi e Madhe fire, March 2019 Malësi e Madhe
The fire started on 28 March 2019 in Malësi e Madhe, Albania, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 159 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 56th largest in Shkodër since 2016 (of 82 with a page). Number 14 in Albania in 2019, of 31.
The power measured by the satellite is low (16.8 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
- 159ha
- Copernicus perimeter
- Duration
- 5days
- 28 Mar 2019 – 1 Apr 2019
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- municipalities
- Started on
- 28 Mar
- 2019
- Heat detections
- 13
- in a single hotspot: 17 MW
- Danger at start
- 6
- Low · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 20MW
- 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 13 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.6 mm on 4 Apr.
This area had burned before
No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.
What happened to each town
-
Malësi e Madhe where it started159 ha reached on 29 Mar0.2 %
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 land66 %
- Scrub and transitional woodland28 %
- Mixed forest4.4 %
- Broadleaved forest1.9 %
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 Mar | 10.0 °C | 24 % | 55 km/h | 0.0 mm | Low 6 |
| 29 Mar | 11.6 °C | 24 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Low 6 |
| 30 Mar | 12.9 °C | 31 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Low 6 |
| 31 Mar | 14.9 °C | 31 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Low 7 |
| 1 Apr | 15.9 °C | 22 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | Low 8 |
| 2 Apr after | 13.6 °C | 46 % | 25 km/h | 0.3 mm | Low 6 |
| 3 Apr after | 10.7 °C | 50 % | 36 km/h | 0.2 mm | Low 6 |
| 4 Apr after | 10.0 °C | 50 % | 41 km/h | 1.6 mm | Very low 1 |
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 2 April 2019 the air beside the fire reached 26 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 20: 1.3 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 · 13Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 2,739 haPodgorica Municipality11 August 2025 · 4 days · 20 km away
- 1,830 haPodgorica Municipality22 August 2017 · 7 days · 23 km away
- 4,057 haPodgorica Municipality11 August 2025 · 7 days · 27 km away
- 2,013 haPodgorica MunicipalityFebruary 2021 · 7 days · 31 km away
- 2,281 haPodgorica Municipality29 July 2024 · 6 days · 32 km away
- 6,019 haPodgorica Municipality1 August 2017 · 26 days · 33 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Malësi e Madhe fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 28 March 2019 to 1 April 2019 (5 days). The perimeter dates it from 28 March 2019 to 29 March 2019.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 159 hectares (1.6 km²). Official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Malësi e Madhe (159 ha, 0.2 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 11.6 °C, humidity dropped to 24 % and gusts hit 55 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 6, class Low.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Albania (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: 128 · 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.
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: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
- Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 28 March 2019 to 29 March 2019. 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.
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 (Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 Generic). 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.