How long did the MALIUC fire last?

Copernicus dates it between 19 September 2017 and 19 September 2017: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.

How much area did it burn?

The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 184 hectares (1.8 km²). Official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire only entered MALIUC (184 ha, 0.7 %).

Did the fire reach a town?

The closest fire to a town centre came within 3.8 km of MALIUC. 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 25.8 °C, humidity dropped to 50 % and gusts hit 44 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 30, class High.

Where does this data come from?

From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Romania (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

RO · Romania · 2017-09-19 → 2017-09-19

MALIUC fire, September 2017 MALIUC

Out · last detection 19 Sept 2017, 11:04 UTC

The fire started on 19 September 2017 in MALIUC, Romania, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 184 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.

This record is fire in the reed beds of the Danube Delta, not a forest fire. Thousands of hectares of reed burn in the delta every year, mostly between January and April, and many of these burns are deliberate. That is why it is left out of the fire rankings.

Burnt area: 184ha; Copernicus perimeter
Duration: 1day; 19 Sept 2017 – 19 Sept 2017
Municipalities hit: 1; municipalities
Started on: 19 Sept; 2017
Heat detections: 11; in a single hotspot: 113 MW
Danger at start: 30; High · FWI index
Energy released: 571MW; sum of detected power

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 19 Sept19 Sept

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

26°high

44km/h · peak gust

50%lowest humidity

It had gone 8 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

MALIUC 813 inhabitants · 3.8 km from the town where it started

184 ha reached on 19 Sept

0.7 %

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

Other natural land93 %
Broadleaved forest7.5 %

Natura 2000 protected area affected: 100 %

LIC Delta Dunării ROSCI0065
ZEPA Delta Dunării și Complexul Razim - Sinoie ROSPA0031

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)
19 Sept	25.8 °C	50 %	44 km/h	0.0 mm	High 30
20 Sept after	26.9 °C	59 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 20
21 Sept after	23.9 °C	44 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	High 24
22 Sept after	21.1 °C	48 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	High 23
23 Sept after	22.0 °C	44 %	22 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 20
24 Sept after	22.3 °C	41 %	22 km/h	0.1 mm	Moderate 20
25 Sept after	23.7 °C	47 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	High 24
26 Sept after	20.7 °C	48 %	58 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
27 Sept after	17.7 °C	46 %	52 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
28 Sept after	16.3 °C	44 %	46 km/h	0.0 mm	High 30
29 Sept after	16.4 °C	40 %	48 km/h	0.0 mm	High 31

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 12 Sept 2017

After · 26 Sept 2017

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 21 September 2017 the air beside the fire reached 20 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 17: 1.1 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak20 µg/m³

Days over the guideline1 day

PM1031 µg/m³

WHO 15

171819202122

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 · 11Every 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 Romania ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the MALIUC fire last?: Copernicus dates it between 19 September 2017 and 19 September 2017: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?: The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 184 hectares (1.8 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire only entered MALIUC (184 ha, 0.7 %).
Did the fire reach a town?: The closest fire to a town centre came within 3.8 km of MALIUC. 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 25.8 °C, humidity dropped to 50 % and gusts hit 44 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 30, class High.
Where does this data come from?: From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Romania (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

IGSU · Inspectoratul General pentru Situații de Urgență ↗

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.

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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.

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 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)). 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