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Mogoke fire, March 2016 Mogoke, Thabeikkyin

Out · last detection 28 Mar 2016, 06:19 UTC

The fire started on 20 March 2016 in Mogoke, Myanmar (Burma), and satellites saw it burning for 9 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,384 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 35th largest in Mandalay since 2016 (of 72 with a page). Number 38 in Myanmar (Burma) in 2016, of 119.

Burnt area
3,384ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
9days
20 Mar 2016 – 28 Mar 2016
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
20 Mar
2016
Heat detections
104
in a single hotspot: 49 MW
Danger at start
29
High · FWI index
Energy released
1.1GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

28 Mar 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 20 Mar28 Mar

How it evolved, day by day

202122232425262728

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

The weather it burned in

35°high
51km/h · peak gust
11%lowest humidity

It had gone 21 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.8 mm on 1 Apr.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Mogoke where it started
    2,683 ha reached on 16 Mar
    2.3 %
  2. Thabeikkyin
    714 ha reached on 22 Mar
    0.3 %

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)
20 Mar 32.1 °C 27 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
21 Mar 32.6 °C 29 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
22 Mar 31.5 °C 32 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
23 Mar 32.0 °C 25 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
24 Mar 32.8 °C 21 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
25 Mar 35.0 °C 11 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
26 Mar 33.6 °C 21 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
27 Mar 33.0 °C 20 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
28 Mar 31.8 °C 19 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
29 Mar after 30.3 °C 25 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
30 Mar after 32.4 °C 36 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
31 Mar after 32.0 °C 34 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
1 Apr after 31.2 °C 28 % 32 km/h 1.8 mm Moderate 16

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 13 Mar 2016
After · 4 Apr 2016

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 · 104Every 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 Myanmar (Burma) ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Mogoke fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 20 March 2016 and 28 March 2016: 9 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 3,384 hectares (33.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Mogoke (2,683 ha, 2.3 %); Thabeikkyin (714 ha, 0.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 35.0 °C, humidity dropped to 11 % and gusts hit 51 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 41, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Myanmar (Burma) (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

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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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.