Burned area
satellite only126ha
Perimeter published by EFFIS (Copernicus).
- Source
- EFFIS (Copernicus)
- Date
- perimeter revised on 26 August 2026
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page to compare it with.
DZ · Algeria ·
Oued El Ma fire, August 2026 وادي الماء · Oued El Ma, El Hassi
Out · last detection 26 Aug 2026, 01:54 UTC
The fire started on 26 August 2026 in Oued El Ma, Algeria, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 126 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 2 municipalities.
Number 178 in Algeria in 2026, of 197.
The power measured by the satellite is low (2.4 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.
Use this data
Compare with…
Use this data
Fire page data · version 2026-10-24matches the official recordwith caveatssatellite onlymodel
When copying, the sentence is
Tick the figures you want: they make up the lede and the CSV.
Duration by satellite
satellite only1day
26 Aug 2026 to 26 Aug 2026: first and last day with fire on the page.
- Source
- EFFIS (Copernicus) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- last detection: 26 Aug 2026, 01:54 UTC
+− cross-check
Satellites pass a few times a day and cloud or smoke can hide the fire: a lack of detections is not an official extinction. Each country’s emergency service declares a fire contained or out.
Start
satellite only26 Aug 2026
First day with fire seen by the satellites or the perimeter.
- Source
- EFFIS (Copernicus) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- 26 Aug 2026
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page, so the alert time and the cause are not known here.
Hotspots
satellite only4
VIIRS detections at 375 m. Most intense hotspot: 2 MW.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (Suomi NPP)
- Date
- 26 Aug 2026 – 26 Aug 2026
+− cross-check
There is no official record to compare with. Each hotspot is a pixel detected in one satellite pass, not a separate fire.
The worst day
satellite only9MW
Total radiative power on 26 August 2026; hotspots that day: 4.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (FRP)
- Date
- 26 Aug 2026
+− cross-check
Fire radiative power (FRP) measures the energy the fire gives off when the satellite passes. Added up by day, it compares intensity, not area.
Danger at the start
model90.7FWI · very extreme
Fire Weather Index (Canadian system) computed by WorldFires for the day the fire started. Consecutive days without rain before: 31.
- Source
- WorldFires calculation (Canadian FWI system)
- Date
- 26 Aug 2026, local noon
- Model
- ERA5 0,25° (ECMWF · Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com
+− cross-check
This is an index computed from weather model data, not a measurement of the fire nor an official warning. Danger warnings are issued by each country’s authority. Emergency number and official warnings
Weather during the fire
model38.5°C · 15% RH
High of 38.5 °C and minimum humidity of 15% on 26 August 2026; gusts of 60 km/h on 26 August 2026.
- Source
- weather model at the fire’s grid cell
- Date
- 26 Aug 2026 – 26 Aug 2026
- Model
- ERA5 0,25° (ECMWF · Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com
+− cross-check
These are model values for a cell of about 25 km, not from a weather station: they may differ from what was measured on the ground.
This page’s change log has been kept since 24 October 2026: every night what it publishes is compared and the difference is logged. Anything earlier is reconstructed from each source’s date and marked as reconstructed.
Show
-
· reconstructed weatherWeather and FWI computed from the ERA5 reanalysis
-
· reconstructed perimeterEFFIS (Copernicus) revises the perimeter
What was saved on 24 October 2026
Every night a snapshot of what the page shows is saved. If anything changes, it appears in the list as a log entry.
- Area
- 126 ha
- Dates
- 26 Aug 2026 – 26 Aug 2026
- Name
- Oued El Ma
- Official record
- —
Versioned permanent link
https://worldfires.org/en/fire/oued-el-ma-2026-08?v=2026-10-24A version keeps the area, dates, name and official record; the area as it was logged (changes under 2% are not logged). The map, hotspots and weather always show today’s data.
Citation
A lede of about 60 words figures only, no adjectives
CSV for this fire oued-el-ma-2026-08.csv · daily, no individual hotspots
| fecha | focos_viirs | frp_mw | tmax_c | tmin_c | hr_min_pct | viento_max_kmh | racha_max_kmh | precip_mm | fwi | clase_fwi | dentro_del_incendio |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-08-26 | 4 | 9 | 38.5 | 27.1 | 15 | 22 | 60.5 | 0 | 90.7 | muy_extremo | 1 |
| 2026-08-27 | 0 | 0 | 38.8 | 24.8 | 12 | 23.4 | 56.2 | 0 | 94.5 | muy_extremo | 0 |
| 2026-08-28 | 0 | 0 | 37.7 | 21 | 15 | 17 | 50.4 | 0 | 75.8 | muy_extremo | 0 |
| 2026-08-29 | 0 | 0 | 36.7 | 24.2 | 13 | 18.3 | 47.5 | 0 | 81 | muy_extremo | 0 |
| 2026-08-30 | 0 | 0 | 36.1 | 24.7 | 18 | 20 | 54 | 1.1 | 81.1 | muy_extremo | 0 |
It is generated in your browser from this page’s data: one file per fire, aggregated by day and without individual hotspots.
Live widget for your story
It updates itself while the fire is still active and links to this page. Free, with the attribution shown at the bottom.
Sources for this page: EFFIS (Copernicus), NASA FIRMS (VIIRS), ERA5 (ECMWF/Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0). Open-Meteo.com · How we build fire pages: methodology
- Burnt area
- 126ha
- Copernicus perimeter
- Duration
- ≈ 1day
- 26 Aug 2026 – 26 Aug 2026
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- communes
- Started on
- 26 Aug
- 2026
- Heat detections
- 4
- in a single hotspot: 2 MW
- Danger at start
- 91
- Very extreme · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 9MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
HOTSPOTS BY DAY
26 Aug26 Aug
How it evolved, day by day
26 Aug 2026 · 9 MW · 4
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
38°high
60km/h · peak gust
15%lowest humidity
It had gone 31 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.1 mm on 30 Aug.
This area had burned before
No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.
What happened to each town
-
87 ha reached on 26 Aug0.4 %
-
39 ha reached on 26 Aug0.6 %
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
- Mixed forest80 %
- Other natural land16 %
- Broadleaved forest3.9 %
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)
Started with Extreme FWI: 48 % of the area in Algeria Strong wind: 18 % of the area in Algeria
| Day | High | Min. humidity | Peak gust | Rain | Danger (FWI) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 26 Aug | 38.5 °C | 15 % | 60 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 91 |
| 27 Aug after | 38.8 °C | 12 % | 56 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 94 |
| 28 Aug after | 37.7 °C | 15 % | 50 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 76 |
| 29 Aug after | 36.7 °C | 13 % | 48 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 81 |
| 30 Aug after | 36.1 °C | 18 % | 54 km/h | 1.1 mm | Very extreme 81 |
Its twins: fires that started in the same weather
It started with an FWI of 90.7, a minimum humidity of 15% and 31 days without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2016: 18.
FWI at the start
90.7
Minimum humidity
15 %
Days without rain
31
this fire
chosen twins
rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar
Outlines of the closest twins
This fire · Oued El Ma fire, August 2026
126 ha
1 day
FWI 90.7
Min. humidity 15 %
Kherrata fire, July 2023
144 ha
2 days
FWI 87.3
Min. humidity 17 %
109 km away, in 2023
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 4.6 mm on 4 Aug.
Zaarouria fire, August 2022
6,254 ha
3 days
FWI 91.7
Min. humidity 13 %
185 km away, in 2022
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
Babar fire, August 2021
214 ha
2 days
FWI 81.8
Min. humidity 10 %
113 km away, in 2021
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 1.0 mm on 17 Aug.
Djemila fire, August 2022
438 ha
1 day
FWI 87.6
Min. humidity 12 %
67 km away, in 2022
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 2.2 mm on 27 Aug.
Harbil fire, June 2022
731 ha
2 days
FWI 96.2
Min. humidity 10 %
113 km away, in 2022
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 1.0 mm on 2 Jul.
What happened to them
- 2 days
- median duration
- 263 ha
- median area
- 22 %
- went past 1,000 ha
- 2.2 mm
- rain at the end (median; 11 of 18 had it)
It stayed below its twins: 126 ha against a median of 263 ha. It lasted 1 day, against 2 days.
In 7 of 18, 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 2.2 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
1.1 mmfirst rain
30 Aug4 days after it ended
60km/h · max. gust
It was considered over on 26 Aug, and on 30 Aug 1.1 mm fell. We do not know whether the rain or the firefighters put it out. Twins with rain when they ended: 11 of 18, with a median of 2.2 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 2016.
- 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.
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
↔
Before · 19 Aug 2026
After · 2 Sept 2026
Sentinel-2 did not pass over on that day. Try another date, or use false colour, which is daily.
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 25 August 2026 the air beside the fire reached 28 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 20: 1.3 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
PM2.5 peak28 µg/m³
Days over the guideline6 days
PM10118 µg/m³
Optical depth0.61
WHO 15
24 Aug26 Aug28 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 · 4Every 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 time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Oued El Ma fire last?
- The official perimeter only gives the start date (26 August 2026). The end comes from the heat detections inside the perimeter: it burned until 26 August 2026 (1 day from 26 August 2026), the last day with detections before more than 10 days in a row without any, so it is approximate.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 126 hectares (1.3 km²). Official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Oued El Ma (87 ha, 0.4 %); El Hassi (39 ha, 0.6 %).
- Did the fire reach a town?
- The fire came within 7.5 km of the centre of El Hassi, the closest of the areas it touched. 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 38.5 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 60 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 91, class Very extreme.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Algeria (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 2016 with a similar FWI, humidity and dry spell: 18. Their median duration was 2 days and their median area 263 ha; 22 % went past 1,000 ha. In 7 of 18, 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 2.2 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: 14 · 1021 · 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.
No changes since 24 October 2026.
RSS Changes to this page With cross-checks and a citable version
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
How we know this
- Perimeter: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
- The official perimeter has no end date: the end is the last day with VIIRS detections inside the perimeter before a gap of more than 10 days (150 days at most), so it is approximate. 4 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.
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 ADM3 (Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0). 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.