Maripasoula fire, 29 October 2026
Maripasoula, Papaichton
Burning · last detection 5 Nov 2026, 17:02 UTC
Satellites first detected fire on 29 October 2026 in Maripasoula, France. It has been active for 8 days, with 21 heat detections and an area with fire of about 252 hectares rebuilt from them, spread across 2 municipalities.
matches the official recordwith caveatssatellite onlymodel
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Burned area
satellite only
≈ 252ha
Estimated from hotspots: no perimeter has been published yet.
Source
NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
Date
29 Oct 2026 – 5 Nov 2026
+− cross-check
This is an estimate from the VIIRS pixels that saw fire. It will change when the perimeter is published.
Duration by satellite
satellite only
8days
From 29 Oct 2026 to today: still being detected.
Source
NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
Date
last detection: 5 Nov 2026, 17:02 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 only
29 Oct 2026
First day with fire seen by the satellites or the perimeter.
Source
NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
Date
29 Oct 2026
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page, so the alert time and the cause are not known here.
Hotspots
satellite only
21
VIIRS detections at 375 m. Most intense hotspot: 34 MW.
Source
NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (Suomi NPP + NOAA-20)
Date
29 Oct 2026 – 5 Nov 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 only
67MW
Total radiative power on 4 November 2026; hotspots that day: 4.
Source
NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (FRP)
Date
4 Nov 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
model
30.5FWI · high
Fire Weather Index (Canadian system) computed by WorldFires for the day the fire started. Consecutive days without rain before: 18.
Source
WorldFires calculation (Canadian FWI system)
Date
29 Oct 2026, local noon
Model
ECMWF IFS 0,25° · Open-Meteo.com · provisional
+− 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
model
35.8°C · 34% RH
High of 35.8 °C and minimum humidity of 34% on 1 November 2026; gusts of 46 km/h on 1 November 2026.
Source
weather model at the fire’s grid cell
Date
29 Oct 2026 – 5 Nov 2026
Model
ECMWF IFS 0,25° · Open-Meteo.com · provisional
+− 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
log
Area: ≈ 154 → ≈ 210 ha.
log
Start date: 23 October 2026 → 29 October 2026.
log
Name: Papaichton → Maripasoula.
· reconstructedweather
Weather and FWI computed from the forecast (provisional until ERA5 arrives)
log
Area: ≈ 168 → ≈ 154 ha.
log
Area: ≈ 182 → ≈ 168 ha.
log
Start date: 22 October 2026 → 23 October 2026.
log
Area: ≈ 308 → ≈ 182 ha.
log
Start date: 21 October 2026 → 22 October 2026.
log
Area: ≈ 392 → ≈ 308 ha.
log
Start date: 20 October 2026 → 21 October 2026.
log
Last day with fire: 24 October 2026 → 27 October 2026.
A 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
Copernicus has not yet published the burnt perimeter, which takes a few days to measure on satellite imagery. For now the area is the one rebuilt from heat detections (about 14 hectares per pixel). When the perimeter arrives, this page picks it up on its own and keeps the same address.
Is it still active?
Satellites detected fire on 5 Nov 2026, 17:02 UTC. Everything suggests it is still burning. 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.
Area with fire
≈ 252ha
rebuilt from hotspots, no official perimeter yet
Duration
8days
29 Oct 2026 – 5 Nov 2026
Municipalities hit
2
communes
Started on
29 Oct
2026
Heat detections
21
in a single hotspot: 34 MW
Danger at start
30
High · FWI index
Average daily power
26MW
detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
HOTSPOTS BY DAY
29 Oct5 Nov
Play back5 Nov 2026
How it evolved, day by day
29 Oct31 Oct2 Nov4 Nov
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
46km/h · peak gust
30%lowest humidity
It had gone 18 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
What happened to each town
Maripasoula9,579 inhabitants · 1.0 km from the centrewhere it started
126 hareached on 29 Oct
0.0 %
Papaichton5,006 inhabitants · 1.8 km from the centre
56 hareached on 30 Oct
0.0 %
Area with fire inside each municipality, rebuilt from heat detections (about 14 hectares per VIIRS pixel). An estimate until the official perimeter arrives. 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.
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) · forecast models, provisional until the ERA5 reanalysis arrives
Day
High
Min. humidity
Peak gust
Rain
Danger (FWI)
29 Oct
35.1 °C
42 %
30 km/h
0.2 mm
High 30
30 Oct
34.9 °C
40 %
31 km/h
0.0 mm
High 31
31 Oct
35.4 °C
30 %
30 km/h
0.0 mm
High 35
1 Nov
35.8 °C
34 %
46 km/h
0.2 mm
High 34
2 Nov
35.8 °C
34 %
35 km/h
0.0 mm
High 35
3 Nov
34.2 °C
40 %
39 km/h
0.9 mm
Very high 38
4 Nov
34.2 °C
40 %
30 km/h
0.0 mm
High 26
5 Nov
34.7 °C
34 %
33 km/h
0.2 mm
High 31
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
↔
Before · 22 Oct 2026
After · 4 Nov 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 · Copernicus
On 8 October 2026 the air beside the fire reached 14 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).
PM2.5 peak14µg/m³
Days over the guideline0days
PM1017µg/m³
Optical depth0.27
29 Sept2 Oct5 Oct8 Oct
GoodFairModeratePoorVery poorExtremely 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· 21Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.›
⬇ Download CSVTimes in UTC. Each detection is a 375 m pixel: a large fire yields hundreds per pass.
According to the heat detections seen by satellite, it burned from 29 October 2026 to 5 November 2026 (8 days between the first and the last detection). There is no perimeter yet to date it.
How much area did it burn?
There is no official perimeter yet. Heat detections rebuild about 252 hectares with fire (2.5 km²); Copernicus will publish the measured figure within days.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Maripasoula (126 ha, 0.0 %); Papaichton (56 ha, 0.0 %).
Is the Maripasoula fire still active?
Yes: satellites detected fire on 5 Nov 2026, 17:02 UTC. Check the emergency service for the official status.
Did the fire reach a town?
The fire started in Maripasoula and came within 1.0 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 35.8 °C, humidity dropped to 30 % and gusts hit 46 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 38, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of France (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.
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 errorHow we know this›
No perimeter yet: the area (≈ 252 ha) is estimated by counting VIIRS pixels with fire, about 14 ha each.
Dates of the first and last VIIRS detection of the cluster. 21 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
Weather: ECMWF IFS model, provisional until the ERA5 reanalysis arrives.
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 ADM5 (Open Data Commons Attribution License 1.0). 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.