How long did the Pakbeng fire last?

According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 30 March 2026 to 19 April 2026 (21 days). The perimeter dates it from 1 April 2026 to 12 April 2026.

How much area did it burn?

The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 4,447 hectares (44.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 2 municipalities: Pakbeng (4,468 ha, 3.5 %); Xienghone (0 ha, 0.0 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 35.9 °C, humidity dropped to 22 % and gusts hit 43 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 34, 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.

LA · Laos · 2026-03-30 → 2026-04-19

Pakbeng fire, 30 March 2026 Pakbeng, Xienghone

Out · last detection 19 Apr 2026, 19:08 UTC

The fire started on 30 March 2026 in Pakbeng, Laos, and satellites saw it burning for 21 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,447 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 70th largest in Oudomxay since 2016 (of 241 with a page). Number 92 in Laos in 2026, of 287.

Burnt area: 4,447ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 21days; 30 Mar 2026 – 19 Apr 2026
Municipalities hit: 2; districts
Started on: 30 Mar; 2026
Heat detections: 82; in a single hotspot: 275 MW
Danger at start: 24; High · FWI index
Energy released: 3.1GW; sum of detected power

Play back 19 Apr 2026

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 30 Mar19 Apr

How it evolved, day by day

2356789101213161719

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

The weather it burned in

36°high

43km/h · peak gust

22%lowest humidity

It had gone 7 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.3 mm on 24 Apr.

This area had burned before

77% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,494 ha in 2016, 1,140 ha in 2019, 1,451 ha in 2023, 1,188 ha in 2024, 1,097 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,427 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

Pakbeng where it started

4,468 ha reached on 2 Apr

3.5 %
Xienghone

0 ha

0.0 %

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)
30 Mar	33.5 °C	31 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	High 24
31 Mar	33.8 °C	33 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	High 25
1 Apr	33.5 °C	38 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	High 22
2 Apr	34.0 °C	36 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	High 25
3 Apr	34.8 °C	32 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	High 25
4 Apr	34.2 °C	35 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	High 26
5 Apr	34.2 °C	38 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	High 27
6 Apr	34.4 °C	39 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	High 26
7 Apr	34.2 °C	41 %	36 km/h	0.3 mm	High 25
8 Apr	34.1 °C	37 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	High 27
9 Apr	33.9 °C	34 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	High 27
10 Apr	33.8 °C	31 %	42 km/h	0.0 mm	High 29
11 Apr	33.9 °C	32 %	43 km/h	0.0 mm	High 29
12 Apr	34.6 °C	22 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	High 32
13 Apr	35.3 °C	30 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	High 33
14 Apr	35.0 °C	32 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	High 33
15 Apr	35.9 °C	30 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
16 Apr	35.9 °C	25 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
17 Apr	34.8 °C	33 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	High 32
18 Apr	33.3 °C	40 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	High 28
19 Apr	33.5 °C	42 %	37 km/h	0.4 mm	High 29
20 Apr after	32.5 °C	47 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	High 25
21 Apr after	35.0 °C	37 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	High 28
22 Apr after	36.0 °C	35 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	High 29
23 Apr after	32.4 °C	48 %	35 km/h	0.4 mm	High 26
24 Apr after	34.0 °C	38 %	29 km/h	1.3 mm	Moderate 19

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 23 Mar 2026

After · 26 Apr 2026

Before After

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 18 April 2026 the air beside the fire reached 237 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 174: 12 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak237 µg/m³

Days over the guideline26 days

PM10278 µg/m³

Optical depth2.54

WHO 15

2829303112345678910111213141516171819202122

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 · 82Every 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

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 30 March 2026 to 19 April 2026 (21 days). The perimeter dates it from 1 April 2026 to 12 April 2026.
How much area did it burn?: The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 4,447 hectares (44.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 2 municipalities: Pakbeng (4,468 ha, 3.5 %); Xienghone (0 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 35.9 °C, humidity dropped to 22 % and gusts hit 43 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 34, 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

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · Copernicus ↗

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.

Where it burned