Mese fire, 15 March 2026 Bawlake, Mese, Shadaw
The fire started on 15 March 2026 in Mese, Myanmar, and satellites saw it burning for 41 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 110,593 hectares from heat detections, spread across 4 municipalities.
This page is probably a fire complex, not a single fire. GWIS merges into one perimeter the fires that touch over weeks, which in large burning seasons can join dozens of separate fires. The total area is reliable; the origin and dates refer to the whole complex.
Other fire pages in the same area and on the same dates:
- 133,850 haMueang Mae Hong Son เมืองแม่ฮ่องสอน17 March 2026 · 39 days
- 65,971 haShadaw13 March 2026 · 44 days
- 32,496 haHpasawng13 March 2026 · 34 days
- 30,393 haPang Mapha ปางมะผ้า23 March 2026 · 31 days
- 22,984 haBawlake17 March 2026 · 29 days
- 13,324 haMae Sariang แม่สะเรียง19 March 2026 · 27 days
- 12,729 haMae La Noi แม่ลาน้อย22 March 2026 · 27 days
- 9,531 haMese17 March 2026 · 19 days
It is the largest fire in Kayah since 2016 (of 209 with a page). Number 2 in Myanmar in 2026, of 480.
Compare with…
Suggestions: Mese · 2024Shadaw · 2020Mese · 2025Bawlake · 2021
- Burnt area
- 110,593ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 41days
- 15 Mar 2026 – 24 Apr 2026
- Municipalities hit
- 4
- municipalities
- Started on
- 15 Mar
- 2026
- Heat detections
- 3,912
- in a single hotspot: 90 MW
- Danger at start
- 12
- Moderate · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 341MW
- 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 one day without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 3.0 mm on 25 Apr.
This area had burned before
93% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 44,851 ha in 2016, 40,857 ha in 2017, 36,365 ha in 2018, 41,600 ha in 2019, 58,542 ha in 2020, 52,817 ha in 2021, 18,177 ha in 2022, 40,175 ha in 2023, 48,070 ha in 2024, 46,003 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 102,778 ha that had burned before.
- 28,123 ha Mese fire, February 2024 36,428 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 16,819 ha Shadaw fire, January 2020 51,616 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 15,984 ha Mese fire, March 2025 21,189 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 13,535 ha Bawlake fire, February 2021 21,859 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 11,512 ha Bawlake fire, March 2023 15,504 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 11,057 ha Mese fire, March 2016 14,694 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 11,042 ha Bawlake fire, March 2018 13,125 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 6,332 ha Bawlake fire, March 2016 7,288 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
Berlin boundary: geoBoundaries · Federal Agency for Cartography and Geodesy (dl-de/by-2-0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
54,201 ha reached on 16 Mar28 %
-
Mese where it started37,256 ha reached on 15 Mar20 %
-
13,523 ha reached on 17 Mar6.2 %
-
616 ha reached on 26 Mar0.4 %
Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS 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.
People and buildings inside the perimeter
GHSL 2025Inside the perimeter there were about 2.2 hectares of built-up land and about 450 residents (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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 15 Mar | 32.3 °C | 52 % | 25 km/h | 0.5 mm | Moderate 12 |
| 16 Mar | 32.9 °C | 49 % | 26 km/h | 0.5 mm | Moderate 15 |
| 17 Mar | 33.8 °C | 41 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 18 |
| 18 Mar | 35.0 °C | 37 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 20 |
| 19 Mar | 35.3 °C | 36 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 20 Mar | 34.0 °C | 41 % | 31 km/h | 0.2 mm | High 22 |
| 21 Mar | 35.7 °C | 43 % | 32 km/h | 1.0 mm | Moderate 18 |
| 22 Mar | 35.7 °C | 36 % | 35 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 24 |
| 23 Mar | 35.6 °C | 32 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 24 Mar | 36.1 °C | 33 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 25 Mar | 36.2 °C | 34 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 26 Mar | 36.9 °C | 32 % | 21 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 27 Mar | 37.5 °C | 33 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 28 Mar | 38.1 °C | 28 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 29 Mar | 38.3 °C | 27 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 30 Mar | 38.1 °C | 30 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 31 Mar | 38.6 °C | 33 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 1 Apr | 38.5 °C | 34 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 2 Apr | 38.8 °C | 31 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 3 Apr | 39.0 °C | 31 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 4 Apr | 37.9 °C | 37 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 5 Apr | 38.0 °C | 41 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 6 Apr | 37.6 °C | 41 % | 28 km/h | 0.2 mm | High 30 |
| 7 Apr | 35.9 °C | 44 % | 32 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 29 |
| 8 Apr | 37.9 °C | 32 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 9 Apr | 36.8 °C | 37 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 10 Apr | 37.3 °C | 32 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 11 Apr | 37.7 °C | 31 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 12 Apr | 38.2 °C | 32 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 13 Apr | 38.5 °C | 36 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 14 Apr | 37.9 °C | 36 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 15 Apr | 37.8 °C | 40 % | 29 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 32 |
| 16 Apr | 37.3 °C | 39 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 17 Apr | 38.4 °C | 34 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 18 Apr | 37.4 °C | 42 % | 29 km/h | 0.7 mm | High 26 |
| 19 Apr | 37.8 °C | 39 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 20 Apr | 37.1 °C | 40 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 21 Apr | 38.4 °C | 38 % | 30 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 28 |
| 22 Apr | 39.0 °C | 38 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 23 Apr | 37.6 °C | 41 % | 33 km/h | 1.8 mm | Moderate 19 |
| 24 Apr | 38.1 °C | 43 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 25 Apr after | 35.4 °C | 50 % | 30 km/h | 3.0 mm | Low 9 |
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 3 April 2026 the air beside the fire reached 155 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 84: 5.6 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 · 3,912Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 36,428 haMese17 February 2024 · 37 days · 6 km away
- 21,189 haMese7 March 2025 · 25 days · 9 km away
- 21,859 haBawlake22 February 2021 · 24 days · 17 km away
- 17,460 haShadaw2 March 2019 · 31 days · 27 km away
- 32,496 haHpasawng13 March 2026 · 34 days · 32 km away
- 133,850 haMueang Mae Hong Son เมืองแม่ฮ่องสอน17 March 2026 · 39 days · 39 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Mese fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 15 March 2026 to 24 April 2026 (41 days). The perimeter dates it from 15 March 2026 to 19 April 2026.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 110,593 hectares (1,105.9 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 4 municipalities: Bawlake (54,201 ha, 28 %); Mese (37,256 ha, 20 %); Shadaw (13,523 ha, 6.2 %); Hpasawng (616 ha, 0.4 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 39.0 °C, humidity dropped to 27 % and gusts hit 40 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 33, class High.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Myanmar (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.
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: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery; 8 polygons grouped in this page.
- Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 15 March 2026 to 19 April 2026. 3,912 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.
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 ADM3 (Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 (CC BY 4.0)). 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.