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Novovorontsovka fire, August 2024 Нововоронцовський район · Novovorontsovka

Out · last detection 18 Aug 2024, 10:20 UTC

The fire started on 13 August 2024 in Novovorontsovka, Ukraine, and satellites saw it burning for 6 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 119 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 959th largest in Kherson Oblast since 2016 (of 1102 with a page). Number 1716 in Ukraine in 2024, of 2092.

The power measured by the satellite is low (10.1 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.

Burnt area
119ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
6days
13 Aug 2024 – 18 Aug 2024
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
13 Aug
2024
Heat detections
10
in a single hotspot: 10 MW
Danger at start
26
High · FWI index
Average daily power
20MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 13 Aug18 Aug
18 Aug 2024

How it evolved, day by day

13 Aug 2024 · 4 MW · 1 16 Aug 2024 · 24 MW · 3 18 Aug 2024 · 33 MW · 6
13 Aug 16 Aug 18 Aug

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

The weather it burned in

32°high
30km/h · peak gust
30%lowest humidity

It had gone 2 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.6 mm on 22 Aug.

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

  1. Novovorontsovka Нововоронцовський район 20,373 inhabitants · 13.4 km from the centre where it started
    119 ha reached on 13 Aug
    0.1 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the official perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.

What burned

  • Other natural land50 %
  • Agricultural areas46 %
  • Mixed forest3.3 %

Land cover inside the perimeter as reported by Copernicus EFFIS (outside the Corine Land Cover area).

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)
13 Aug 27.6 °C 32 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
14 Aug 26.8 °C 36 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
15 Aug 28.1 °C 33 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
16 Aug 29.6 °C 32 % 18 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
17 Aug 32.0 °C 30 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
18 Aug 31.7 °C 31 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
19 Aug after 33.3 °C 23 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
20 Aug after 33.4 °C 23 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
21 Aug after 31.6 °C 35 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
22 Aug after 27.4 °C 50 % 18 km/h 1.6 mm Moderate 12

Its twins: fires that started in the same weather

It started with an FWI of 26.2, a minimum humidity of 32% and 2 days without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2022: 41.

FWI at the start 26.2
Minimum humidity 32 %
Days without rain 2
this fire chosen twins rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar

Outlines of the closest twins

Beryslav fire, July 2024
1,988 ha 3 days FWI 27.2 Min. humidity 32 % 78 km away, in 2024

First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.

What happened to them

2 days
median duration
168 ha
median area
7 %
went past 1,000 ha
7.1 mm
rain at the end (median; 27 of 41 had it)

It burned an area similar to its twins (119 ha against a median of 168 ha) and lasted 6 days, against 2 days.

In 14 of 41, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 7.1 mm.

This is a bank of analogues: it shows what usually happens, not what will happen. With fewer than 15 twins we give no figures. How we calculate it

How it ended

1.6 mmfirst rain
22 Aug4 days after it ended
30km/h · max. gust

It was considered over on 18 Aug, and on 22 Aug 1.6 mm fell. We do not know whether the rain or the firefighters put it out. Twins with rain when they ended: 27 of 41, with a median of 7.1 mm.

Weather on this page: Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)

How a twin is chosen

  • Same area: fires that have already ended, less than 250 km from this one, since 2022.
  • Same start: we compare the FWI on the first day, the minimum humidity that day and the run of days without rain before it. The slider sets how much they may differ.
  • Only pages with final weather data (ERA5 reanalysis) calculated in the same way as this fire’s; agricultural and grass burns and pages with data under review are left out.
  • Fires burning at the same time as this one (a week before or after) are left out: they share the same spell of weather and do not count as a precedent.
  • They are sorted by similarity, and the outlines of the first five are drawn.

How we calculate it

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 6 Aug 2024
After · 25 Aug 2024

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 11 August 2024 the air beside the fire reached 17 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak17 µg/m³
Days over the guideline0 days
PM1020 µg/m³
Optical depth0.27
11 Aug14 Aug17 Aug20 Aug
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 · 10Every 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 Ukraine

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Novovorontsovka fire last?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 13 August 2024 to 18 August 2024 (6 days). The perimeter dates it from 13 August 2024 to 14 August 2024.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 119 hectares (1.2 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Novovorontsovka (119 ha, 0.1 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The fire started in Novovorontsovka and came within 13.4 km of its centre. That is the distance from the perimeter, or the nearest hotspot, to the point marking the centre; it does not mean it entered the houses.
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 32.0 °C, humidity dropped to 30 % and gusts hit 30 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 30, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Ukraine (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.
How did the fires that started in similar weather in this area end?
Fires less than 250 km away that started since 2022 with a similar FWI, humidity and dry spell: 41. Their median duration was 2 days and their median area 168 ha; 7 % went past 1,000 ha. In 14 of 41, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 7.1 mm.

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.

Emergency number: 101 · 112 · Emergency number and official warnings

Satellite cross-check

History of this page Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.

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
What do you think is wrong?

We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy. This is not an emergency service: if there is a fire now, call 101 · 112.

How we know this
  • Perimeter: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
  • Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 13 August 2024 to 14 August 2024. 10 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
  • We have not matched this page with any official record.
  • Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.

How we build fire pages: methodology

Where this data comes from

The perimeter and land cover come from the Copernicus European Forest Fire Information System (EFFIS), measured on MODIS and Sentinel-2 imagery and published under CC BY 4.0. 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 (Public Domain). The area per municipality is computed by WorldFires by crossing the perimeter with those boundaries, so it may differ slightly from each country’s official figure.