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Mongping fire, 20 March 2021 Mongping, Kunhing

Out · last detection 2 Apr 2021, 05:46 UTC

The fire started on 20 March 2021 in Mongping, Myanmar (Burma), and satellites saw it burning for 13 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 11,132 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 39th largest in Shan since 2016 (of 723 with a page). Number 9 in Myanmar (Burma) in 2021, of 159.

Burnt area
11,132ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
13days
20 Mar 2021 – 1 Apr 2021
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
20 Mar
2021
Heat detections
381
in a single hotspot: 173 MW
Danger at start
33
High · FWI index
Energy released
4.9GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

2 Apr 2021
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 20 Mar1 Apr

How it evolved, day by day

20212223242526272829303112

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

The weather it burned in

37°high
47km/h · peak gust
18%lowest humidity

It had gone 28 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.1 mm on 4 Apr.

This area had burned before

95% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 3,955 ha in 2016, 7,288 ha in 2017, 2,274 ha in 2018, 7,599 ha in 2019, 9,660 ha in 2020. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 10,572 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Mongping where it started
    11,188 ha reached on 17 Mar
    1.8 %
  2. Kunhing
    1 ha reached on 30 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 36.8 °C 24 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
21 Mar 37.4 °C 18 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
22 Mar 35.2 °C 24 % 47 km/h 0.4 mm High 37
23 Mar 34.1 °C 39 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
24 Mar 34.1 °C 35 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
25 Mar 36.6 °C 25 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
26 Mar 35.2 °C 28 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
27 Mar 36.6 °C 19 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
28 Mar 35.9 °C 21 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
29 Mar 33.8 °C 29 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
30 Mar 35.0 °C 20 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
31 Mar 36.6 °C 21 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
1 Apr 36.4 °C 24 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
2 Apr after 37.3 °C 21 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
3 Apr after 33.3 °C 26 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
4 Apr after 24.8 °C 39 % 18 km/h 1.1 mm Moderate 15

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 13 Mar 2021
After · 8 Apr 2021

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 · 381Every 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 2021 and 1 April 2021: 13 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 11,132 hectares (111.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Mongping (11,188 ha, 1.8 %); Kunhing (1 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 37.4 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 47 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 38, 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.