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Parklai fire, 16 March 2023 Parklai, Xayabury, Kasy

Out · last detection 17 Apr 2023, 18:50 UTC

The fire started on 16 March 2023 in Parklai, Laos, and satellites saw it burning for 33 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 11,260 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.

It is the 14th largest in Xaignabouli since 2016 (of 160 with a page). Number 22 in Laos in 2023, of 239.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Parklai · 2016Parklai · 2020Parklai · 2026Phiang · 2016

Burnt area
11,260ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
33days
16 Mar 2023 – 17 Apr 2023
Municipalities hit
3
districts
Started on
16 Mar
2023
Heat detections
553
in a single hotspot: 76 MW
Danger at start
36
High · FWI index
Average daily power
108MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 16 Mar17 Apr
17 Apr 2023

How it evolved, day by day

16 Mar 2023 · 5 MW · 1 17 Mar 2023 · 2 MW · 1 19 Mar 2023 · 9 MW · 2 21 Mar 2023 · 3 MW · 2 22 Mar 2023 · 35 MW · 7 23 Mar 2023 · 39 MW · 10 24 Mar 2023 · 20 MW · 4 25 Mar 2023 · 69 MW · 15 26 Mar 2023 · 200 MW · 35 27 Mar 2023 · 135 MW · 19 28 Mar 2023 · 60 MW · 18 29 Mar 2023 · 21 MW · 8 30 Mar 2023 · 208 MW · 23 31 Mar 2023 · 227 MW · 31 1 Apr 2023 · 204 MW · 38 2 Apr 2023 · 495 MW · 34 3 Apr 2023 · 366 MW · 71 4 Apr 2023 · 500 MW · 99 5 Apr 2023 · 85 MW · 32 6 Apr 2023 · 28 MW · 17 7 Apr 2023 · 4 MW · 4 9 Apr 2023 · 9 MW · 1 10 Apr 2023 · 65 MW · 9 11 Apr 2023 · 42 MW · 10 12 Apr 2023 · 6 MW · 4 14 Apr 2023 · 36 MW · 11 15 Apr 2023 · 86 MW · 14 16 Apr 2023 · 35 MW · 5 17 Apr 2023 · 143 MW · 28
16 Mar 23 Mar 28 Mar 2 Apr 4 Apr 7 Apr 14 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

39°high
38km/h · peak gust
21%lowest humidity

It had gone 4 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

52% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,178 ha in 2016, 958 ha in 2017, 1,488 ha in 2019, 2,860 ha in 2020. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 5,882 ha that had burned before.

How big is it?

10 km
It burned the equivalent of 7.1% of the area of London (113 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. Parklai where it started
    8,005 ha reached on 16 Mar
    3.6 %
  2. Xayabury
    3,313 ha reached on 25 Mar
    1.5 %
  3. Kasy
    10 ha reached on 26 Mar
    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 area< 0.1 ha
Residents≈ 100

Inside the perimeter there were about 0.09 hectares of built-up land and about 100 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)
23 Mar 39.3 °C 22 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
24 Mar 38.8 °C 25 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
25 Mar 39.4 °C 21 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
26 Mar 37.7 °C 26 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
27 Mar 36.6 °C 34 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
28 Mar 35.7 °C 42 % 35 km/h 0.1 mm High 29
29 Mar 34.4 °C 51 % 31 km/h 0.5 mm High 24
30 Mar 34.8 °C 44 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
31 Mar 37.0 °C 33 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
1 Apr 37.5 °C 32 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
2 Apr 39.1 °C 22 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
3 Apr 38.8 °C 23 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
4 Apr 38.3 °C 25 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
5 Apr 38.6 °C 23 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
6 Apr 38.4 °C 27 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
7 Apr 37.4 °C 33 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
8 Apr 35.6 °C 49 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
9 Apr 35.7 °C 44 % 31 km/h 0.1 mm High 28
10 Apr 38.4 °C 35 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
11 Apr 39.9 °C 32 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
12 Apr 40.3 °C 29 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
13 Apr 39.0 °C 36 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
14 Apr 40.5 °C 32 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
15 Apr 40.6 °C 29 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
16 Apr 35.8 °C 51 % 34 km/h 0.2 mm High 29
17 Apr 39.1 °C 32 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
18 Apr after 40.8 °C 31 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
19 Apr after 40.9 °C 27 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
20 Apr after 39.8 °C 36 % 29 km/h 0.9 mm High 28

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 9 Mar 2023
After · 24 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 6 April 2023 the air beside the fire reached 691 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 383: 26 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak691 µg/m³
Days over the guideline38 days
PM10987 µg/m³
Optical depth3.98
1415161718192021222324252627282930311234567891011121314151617181920
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 · 553Every 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 Parklai fire last?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 16 March 2023 to 17 April 2023 (33 days). The perimeter dates it from 23 March 2023 to 10 April 2023.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 11,260 hectares (112.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 3 municipalities: Parklai (8,005 ha, 3.6 %); Xayabury (3,313 ha, 1.5 %); Kasy (10 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 39.4 °C, humidity dropped to 21 % and gusts hit 38 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 39, class Very 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; 3 polygons grouped in this page.
  • Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 23 March 2023 to 10 April 2023. 553 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.