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Pakbeng fire, 24 March 2023 Pakbeng, Pha Oudom, Paktha

Out · last detection 15 Apr 2023, 06:58 UTC

The fire started on 24 March 2023 in Pakbeng, Laos, and satellites saw it burning for 23 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 7,730 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.

It is the 26th largest in Oudomxay since 2016 (of 239 with a page). Number 35 in Laos in 2023, of 239.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Paktha · 2020Pakbeng · 2019Pakbeng · 2020Paktha · 2022

Burnt area
7,730ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
23days
24 Mar 2023 – 15 Apr 2023
Municipalities hit
3
districts
Started on
24 Mar
2023
Heat detections
339
in a single hotspot: 309 MW
Danger at start
18
Moderate · FWI index
Average daily power
481MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 24 Mar15 Apr
15 Apr 2023

How it evolved, day by day

24 Mar 2023 · 210 MW · 14 25 Mar 2023 · 552 MW · 14 26 Mar 2023 · 57 MW · 7 27 Mar 2023 · 100 MW · 1 28 Mar 2023 · 1,971 MW · 47 29 Mar 2023 · 358 MW · 8 30 Mar 2023 · 791 MW · 9 31 Mar 2023 · 771 MW · 24 1 Apr 2023 · 41 MW · 4 2 Apr 2023 · 312 MW · 8 3 Apr 2023 · 724 MW · 41 4 Apr 2023 · 3,838 MW · 58 5 Apr 2023 · 677 MW · 37 6 Apr 2023 · 220 MW · 10 7 Apr 2023 · 52 MW · 6 8 Apr 2023 · 63 MW · 4 9 Apr 2023 · 41 MW · 6 10 Apr 2023 · 7 MW · 3 11 Apr 2023 · 169 MW · 17 12 Apr 2023 · 24 MW · 5 13 Apr 2023 · 25 MW · 9 14 Apr 2023 · 15 MW · 3 15 Apr 2023 · 35 MW · 4
24 Mar 28 Mar 1 Apr 4 Apr 5 Apr 9 Apr 13 Apr

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

The weather it burned in

37°high
42km/h · peak gust
26%lowest humidity

It had gone 5 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 3.4 mm on 22 Apr.

This area had burned before

75% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,542 ha in 2016, 129 ha in 2017, 1,605 ha in 2019, 3,261 ha in 2020, 1,561 ha in 2022. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 5,782 ha that had burned before.

How big is it?

10 km
It burned the equivalent of 4.9% of the area of London (77 km² against 1,583 km²).

London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).

This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.

What happened to each town

  1. Pakbeng where it started
    6,851 ha
    5.4 %
  2. Pha Oudom
    884 ha
    0.5 %
  3. Paktha
    32 ha
    0.0 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS 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.

People and buildings inside the perimeter

GHSL 2025
Built-up area0.76 ha
Residents≈ 2,200

Inside the perimeter there were about 0.76 hectares of built-up land and about 2,200 residents (GHSL 2025, satellite-based estimate).

This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned. The GHSL 2025 epoch is a projection made from 2020 and earlier data.

Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu

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)
24 Mar 32.6 °C 33 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
25 Mar 32.6 °C 34 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19
26 Mar 32.9 °C 31 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
27 Mar 32.3 °C 38 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
28 Mar 34.1 °C 29 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
29 Mar 33.1 °C 31 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
30 Mar 32.5 °C 35 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
31 Mar 32.7 °C 36 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
1 Apr 33.8 °C 34 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
2 Apr 34.3 °C 30 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
3 Apr 32.9 °C 31 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
4 Apr 33.2 °C 30 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
5 Apr 33.5 °C 26 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
6 Apr 33.5 °C 34 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
7 Apr 33.4 °C 36 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
8 Apr 33.8 °C 41 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
9 Apr 35.0 °C 38 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
10 Apr 35.8 °C 30 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
11 Apr 35.9 °C 29 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
12 Apr 35.8 °C 29 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
13 Apr 36.1 °C 33 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
14 Apr 37.0 °C 28 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
15 Apr 36.0 °C 30 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
16 Apr after 36.3 °C 35 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
17 Apr after 35.5 °C 37 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
18 Apr after 36.8 °C 31 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
19 Apr after 37.1 °C 28 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
20 Apr after 35.6 °C 29 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
21 Apr after 35.9 °C 32 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
22 Apr after 35.1 °C 38 % 28 km/h 3.4 mm Low 10

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 17 Mar 2023
After · 22 Apr 2023

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 27 March 2023 the air beside the fire reached 484 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 243: 16 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak484 µg/m³
Days over the guideline28 days
PM10691 µg/m³
Optical depth2.73
22232425262728293031123456789101112131415161718
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 · 339Every 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 Pakbeng fire last?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 24 March 2023 to 15 April 2023 (23 days). The perimeter dates it from 24 March 2023 to 8 April 2023.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 7,730 hectares (77.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 3 municipalities: Pakbeng (6,851 ha, 5.4 %); Pha Oudom (884 ha, 0.5 %); Paktha (32 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 37.0 °C, humidity dropped to 26 % and gusts hit 42 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 31, 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

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

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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How we know this
  • Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery; 2 polygons grouped in this page.
  • Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 24 March 2023 to 8 April 2023. 339 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.
  • Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2025, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.

How we build fire pages: methodology ›

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.