Mongping fire, 23 March 2023 Mongping
The fire started on 23 March 2023 in Mongping, Myanmar (Burma), and satellites saw it burning for 6 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,701 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 153th largest in Shan since 2016 (of 723 with a page). Number 44 in Myanmar (Burma) in 2023, of 212.
- Burnt area
- 4,701ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 6days
- 23 Mar 2023 – 28 Mar 2023
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- municipalities
- Started on
- 23 Mar
- 2023
- Heat detections
- 162
- in a single hotspot: 91 MW
- Danger at start
- 25
- High · FWI index
- Energy released
- 924MW
- sum of detected power
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 9 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
93% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,305 ha in 2016, 2,373 ha in 2017, 14 ha in 2018, 2,499 ha in 2019, 2,551 ha in 2020, 2,010 ha in 2021. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 4,361 ha that had burned before.
- 2,551 ha Mongping fire, March 2020 18,378 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,946 ha Mongping fire, March 2021 11,132 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,865 ha Mongping fire, March 2016 3,633 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,614 ha Mongping fire, April 2019 3,667 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,138 ha Mongping fire, April 2017 8,474 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 206 ha Mongping fire, March 2016 2,238 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 64 ha Mongping fire, March 2021 3,724 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 14 ha Mongping fire, April 2018 2,636 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Mongping where it started4,727 ha reached on 22 Mar0.8 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 23 Mar | 30.0 °C | 27 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 24 Mar | 29.4 °C | 27 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 25 Mar | 29.9 °C | 23 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 26 Mar | 30.6 °C | 23 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 27 Mar | 31.6 °C | 25 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 28 Mar | 31.3 °C | 26 % | 40 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 30 |
| 29 Mar after | 28.8 °C | 30 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 30 Mar after | 30.6 °C | 27 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 31 Mar after | 30.6 °C | 28 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 1 Apr after | 31.6 °C | 25 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 2 Apr after | 31.1 °C | 22 % | 51 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 35 |
| 3 Apr after | 29.5 °C | 26 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 4 Apr after | 29.7 °C | 25 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 5 Apr after | 32.0 °C | 20 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 6 Apr after | 32.0 °C | 24 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 7 Apr after | 33.0 °C | 25 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
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.
Detections table · 162Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 44,192 haKunhing18 March 2026 · 21 days · 2 km away
- 18,378 haMongping18 March 2020 · 19 days · 5 km away
- 19,234 haMongping20 March 2026 · 18 days · 23 km away
- 23,002 haMongping20 March 2026 · 17 days · 27 km away
- 19,688 haMongping15 March 2021 · 16 days · 31 km away
- 22,039 haMongping19 March 2020 · 15 days · 33 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Mongping fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 23 March 2023 and 28 March 2023: 6 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 4,701 hectares (47.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Mongping (4,727 ha, 0.8 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 31.6 °C, humidity dropped to 23 % and gusts hit 40 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 30, class 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.
Report an error
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.