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Mongping fire, 20 March 2020 Mongping, Mongton

Out · last detection 27 Mar 2020, 19:12 UTC

The fire started on 20 March 2020 in Mongping, Myanmar (Burma), and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,950 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 335th largest in Shan since 2016 (of 723 with a page). Number 92 in Myanmar (Burma) in 2020, of 166.

Burnt area
2,950ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
8days
20 Mar 2020 – 27 Mar 2020
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
20 Mar
2020
Heat detections
134
in a single hotspot: 46 MW
Danger at start
39
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
376MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

27 Mar 2020
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 20 Mar27 Mar

How it evolved, day by day

2021222324252627

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

The weather it burned in

34°high
37km/h · peak gust
20%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months 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

  1. Mongping where it started
    2,942 ha reached on 18 Mar
    0.5 %
  2. Mongton
    14 ha reached on 18 Mar
    0.0 %

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 34.1 °C 21 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
21 Mar 32.6 °C 29 % 34 km/h 1.6 mm High 23
22 Mar 32.7 °C 26 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
23 Mar 32.1 °C 27 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
24 Mar 33.4 °C 23 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
25 Mar 33.5 °C 23 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
26 Mar 34.2 °C 20 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
27 Mar 34.3 °C 25 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
28 Mar after 35.2 °C 26 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
29 Mar after 36.4 °C 26 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
30 Mar after 37.0 °C 24 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
31 Mar after 36.5 °C 27 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
1 Apr after 37.3 °C 20 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
2 Apr after 36.5 °C 19 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
3 Apr after 36.6 °C 19 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
4 Apr after 36.1 °C 21 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
5 Apr after 35.7 °C 20 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
6 Apr after 35.4 °C 21 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 13 Mar 2020
After · 3 Apr 2020

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 · 134Every 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 Mongping fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 20 March 2020 and 27 March 2020: 8 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 2,950 hectares (29.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Mongping (2,942 ha, 0.5 %); Mongton (14 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 34.3 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 37 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 39, 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.