Namor fire, March 2026 Namor, Xay
The fire started on 29 March 2026 in Namor, Laos, and satellites saw it burning for 27 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,848 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.
It is the 60th largest in Oudomxay since 2016 (of 241 with a page). Number 88 in Laos in 2026, of 287.
- Burnt area
- 4,848ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 27days
- 29 Mar 2026 – 24 Apr 2026
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- districts
- Started on
- 29 Mar
- 2026
- Heat detections
- 216
- in a single hotspot: 308 MW
- Danger at start
- 27
- High · FWI index
- Energy released
- 6.8GW
- 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 6 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 7.0 mm on 26 Apr.
This area had burned before
93% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 16 ha in 2017, 1,778 ha in 2018, 2,854 ha in 2019, 1,326 ha in 2020, 1,805 ha in 2021, 3,276 ha in 2022, 3,910 ha in 2023, 1,020 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 4,525 ha that had burned before.
- 2,324 ha Namor fire, March 2023 8,366 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,805 ha Namor fire, April 2021 6,631 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,700 ha Namor fire, April 2019 2,205 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,684 ha Namor fire, April 2022 2,252 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,580 ha Namor fire, April 2022 3,197 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 23 ha Namor fire, April 2018 3,567 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 12 ha Xay fire, April 2017 2,113 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Namor where it started3,712 ha reached on 29 Mar2.1 %
-
1,160 ha reached on 29 Mar0.5 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 29 Mar | 32.7 °C | 27 % | 54 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 30 Mar | 33.1 °C | 30 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 31 Mar | 32.7 °C | 35 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 1 Apr | 32.5 °C | 38 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 2 Apr | 33.3 °C | 36 % | 47 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 3 Apr | 34.9 °C | 29 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 4 Apr | 34.6 °C | 31 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 5 Apr | 34.1 °C | 35 % | 48 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 6 Apr | 34.4 °C | 34 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 7 Apr | 33.9 °C | 40 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 8 Apr | 34.1 °C | 35 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 9 Apr | 33.1 °C | 36 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 10 Apr | 32.7 °C | 33 % | 49 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 11 Apr | 33.3 °C | 33 % | 48 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 12 Apr | 34.4 °C | 23 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 13 Apr | 35.2 °C | 27 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 14 Apr | 34.8 °C | 31 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 15 Apr | 34.3 °C | 35 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 16 Apr | 34.5 °C | 30 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 17 Apr | 34.4 °C | 34 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 18 Apr | 32.1 °C | 39 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 19 Apr | 31.6 °C | 51 % | 36 km/h | 0.8 mm | Moderate 19 |
| 20 Apr | 32.3 °C | 40 % | 40 km/h | 0.4 mm | High 25 |
| 21 Apr | 33.8 °C | 40 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 22 Apr | 34.6 °C | 35 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 23 Apr | 31.4 °C | 40 % | 36 km/h | 1.5 mm | Moderate 17 |
| 24 Apr | 33.8 °C | 36 % | 26 km/h | 0.3 mm | High 26 |
| 25 Apr after | 31.0 °C | 50 % | 28 km/h | 0.9 mm | Moderate 16 |
| 26 Apr after | 27.4 °C | 63 % | 36 km/h | 7.0 mm | Very low 3 |
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 18 April 2026 the air beside the fire reached 228 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 170: 11 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 · 216Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Namor fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 29 March 2026 to 24 April 2026 (27 days). The perimeter dates it from 3 April 2026 to 19 April 2026.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 4,848 hectares (48.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Namor (3,712 ha, 2.1 %); Xay (1,160 ha, 0.5 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 35.2 °C, humidity dropped to 23 % and gusts hit 54 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 34, class High.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Laos (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 ADM2 (Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY 3.0 IGO)). 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.