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Nong fire, 15 March 2026 Nong, Phine, Sepone

Out · last detection 22 Apr 2026, 05:41 UTC

The fire started on 15 March 2026 in Nong, Laos, and satellites saw it burning for 39 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 58,742 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.

It is the largest fire in Savannakhet since 2016 (of 96 with a page). Number 2 in Laos in 2026, of 287.

Burnt area
58,742ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
39days
15 Mar 2026 – 22 Apr 2026
Municipalities hit
3
districts
Started on
15 Mar
2026
Heat detections
1,878
in a single hotspot: 393 MW
Danger at start
27
High · FWI index
Energy released
36.2GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

22 Apr 2026
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 15 Mar22 Apr

How it evolved, day by day

151718192021222324252627282930311234567891011121314151617182122

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

The weather it burned in

41°high
49km/h · peak gust
24%lowest humidity

It had gone 19 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 5.2 mm on 18 Apr.

This area had burned before

71% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 6,166 ha in 2016, 16,460 ha in 2017, 13,149 ha in 2018, 21,619 ha in 2019, 12,101 ha in 2020, 12,988 ha in 2021, 9,920 ha in 2022, 11,717 ha in 2023, 9,542 ha in 2024, 8,703 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 41,741 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Nong where it started
    41,076 ha reached on 15 Mar
    22 %
  2. Phine
    13,675 ha reached on 17 Mar
    4.1 %
  3. Sepone
    4,339 ha reached on 19 Mar
    2.1 %

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)
19 Mar 34.6 °C 36 % 27 km/h 0.1 mm High 27
20 Mar 34.4 °C 41 % 30 km/h 2.2 mm Moderate 11
21 Mar 34.5 °C 39 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
22 Mar 35.2 °C 43 % 26 km/h 0.2 mm High 23
23 Mar 36.2 °C 41 % 23 km/h 0.2 mm High 23
24 Mar 35.4 °C 43 % 35 km/h 0.3 mm High 24
25 Mar 36.6 °C 41 % 31 km/h 0.1 mm High 25
26 Mar 37.8 °C 35 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
27 Mar 39.1 °C 29 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
28 Mar 38.4 °C 32 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
29 Mar 37.4 °C 34 % 34 km/h 0.1 mm High 33
30 Mar 38.4 °C 27 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
31 Mar 38.7 °C 27 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
1 Apr 38.6 °C 29 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
2 Apr 38.0 °C 31 % 29 km/h 0.2 mm High 34
3 Apr 38.4 °C 33 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
4 Apr 36.0 °C 41 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
5 Apr 37.4 °C 35 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
6 Apr 39.7 °C 29 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
7 Apr 39.1 °C 28 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
8 Apr 40.9 °C 24 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
9 Apr 40.5 °C 27 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
10 Apr 39.4 °C 29 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
11 Apr 39.8 °C 29 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
12 Apr 40.2 °C 28 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
13 Apr 39.7 °C 27 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
14 Apr 39.8 °C 29 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
15 Apr 38.8 °C 30 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
16 Apr 37.4 °C 36 % 34 km/h 0.1 mm High 36
17 Apr 37.6 °C 41 % 26 km/h 0.6 mm High 26
18 Apr 35.7 °C 47 % 34 km/h 5.2 mm Low 8

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 8 Mar 2026
After · 29 Apr 2026

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 · Copernicus

On 15 April 2026 the air beside the fire reached 104 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 63: 4.2 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak104 µg/m³
Days over the guideline34 days
PM10107 µg/m³
Optical depth2.30
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Good Fair Moderate Poor Very poor Extremely poor

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 · 1,878Every 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 Laos ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Nong fire last?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 15 March 2026 to 22 April 2026 (39 days). The perimeter dates it from 19 March 2026 to 16 April 2026.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 58,742 hectares (587.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 3 municipalities: Nong (41,076 ha, 22 %); Phine (13,675 ha, 4.1 %); Sepone (4,339 ha, 2.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 40.9 °C, humidity dropped to 24 % and gusts hit 49 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 46, class Very 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.

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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 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.