Skip to content
worldfires
TH · Thailand · →

Pai fire, 5 March 2017 Pai

Out · last detection 9 Mar 2017, 06:30 UTC

The fire started on 5 March 2017 in Pai, Thailand, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 1,199 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 502th largest in Mae Hong Son Province since 2016 (of 668 with a page). Number 173 in Thailand in 2017, of 240.

The power measured by the satellite is low (9.8 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
1,199ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
5days
5 Mar 2017 – 9 Mar 2017
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
5 Mar
2017
Heat detections
33
in a single hotspot: 10 MW
Danger at start
31
High · FWI index
Energy released
103MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

9 Mar 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 5 Mar9 Mar

How it evolved, day by day

56789

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
53km/h · peak gust
22%lowest humidity

It had gone 49 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

65% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 967 ha in 2016. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 777 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Pai where it started
    1,205 ha reached on 2 Mar
    0.5 %

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)
2 Mar 32.5 °C 27 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
3 Mar 32.0 °C 24 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
4 Mar 31.8 °C 27 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
5 Mar 31.3 °C 22 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
6 Mar 32.5 °C 23 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
7 Mar 31.7 °C 23 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
8 Mar 31.5 °C 34 % 37 km/h 0.3 mm High 30
9 Mar 30.9 °C 30 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
10 Mar after 30.4 °C 41 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
11 Mar after 31.4 °C 38 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
12 Mar after 31.7 °C 30 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
13 Mar after 31.4 °C 32 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
14 Mar after 33.1 °C 30 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
15 Mar after 33.0 °C 24 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
16 Mar after 34.1 °C 20 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
17 Mar after 33.5 °C 24 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
18 Mar after 33.4 °C 21 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
19 Mar after 32.3 °C 25 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 26 Feb 2017
After · 16 Mar 2017

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 · 33Every 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 Thailand ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Pai fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 5 March 2017 and 9 March 2017: 5 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 1,199 hectares (12.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Pai (1,205 ha, 0.5 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 32.5 °C, humidity dropped to 22 % and gusts hit 53 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 35, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Thailand (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.

Emergency number: 199 · 191

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
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 199 · 191.

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.