How long did the Pha Oudom fire last?

According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 13 March 2020 to 10 April 2020 (29 days). The perimeter dates it from 20 March 2020 to 3 April 2020.

How much area did it burn?

The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 10,788 hectares (107.9 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 2 municipalities: Pha Oudom (9,152 ha, 5.4 %); Huoixai (1,695 ha, 1.0 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 40.1 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 48 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 46, 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.

LA · Laos · 2020-03-13 → 2020-04-10

Pha Oudom fire, 13 March 2020 Pha Oudom, Huoixai

Out · last detection 10 Apr 2020, 18:09 UTC

The fire started on 13 March 2020 in Pha Oudom, Laos, and satellites saw it burning for 29 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 10,788 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 3th largest in Bokeo since 2016 (of 59 with a page). Number 6 in Laos in 2020, of 169.

Burnt area: 10,788ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 29days; 13 Mar 2020 – 10 Apr 2020
Municipalities hit: 2; districts
Started on: 13 Mar; 2020
Heat detections: 594; in a single hotspot: 480 MW
Danger at start: 37; High · FWI index
Energy released: 10.8GW; sum of detected power

Play back 10 Apr 2020

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 13 Mar10 Apr

How it evolved, day by day

1314151718192021222324252627282930311234567810

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

The weather it burned in

40°high

48km/h · peak gust

20%lowest humidity

It had gone 7 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 8.0 mm on 13 Apr.

This area had burned before

50% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,563 ha in 2016, 2,618 ha in 2017, 1,895 ha in 2018, 4,634 ha in 2019. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 5,392 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

Pha Oudom where it started

9,152 ha reached on 13 Mar

5.4 %
Huoixai

1,695 ha reached on 13 Mar

1.0 %

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)
13 Mar	37.9 °C	26 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
14 Mar	37.6 °C	29 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
15 Mar	35.8 °C	44 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	High 30
16 Mar	36.1 °C	42 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	High 31
17 Mar	38.1 °C	26 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
18 Mar	38.3 °C	25 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38
19 Mar	37.3 °C	23 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
20 Mar	36.0 °C	36 %	44 km/h	0.2 mm	High 36
21 Mar	37.0 °C	20 %	41 km/h	0.3 mm	Very high 42
22 Mar	37.3 °C	24 %	36 km/h	0.3 mm	Very high 41
23 Mar	36.3 °C	24 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
24 Mar	36.9 °C	28 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 41
25 Mar	37.2 °C	23 %	45 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
26 Mar	37.6 °C	20 %	42 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
27 Mar	38.0 °C	23 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
28 Mar	38.3 °C	24 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
29 Mar	39.0 °C	26 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
30 Mar	39.3 °C	27 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
31 Mar	39.4 °C	26 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
1 Apr	40.1 °C	22 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
2 Apr	39.4 °C	20 %	42 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
3 Apr	39.7 °C	21 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
4 Apr	39.4 °C	23 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
5 Apr	38.5 °C	29 %	48 km/h	0.2 mm	Very high 44
6 Apr	38.1 °C	27 %	45 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
7 Apr	38.5 °C	25 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
8 Apr	37.9 °C	28 %	43 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 41
9 Apr	35.6 °C	39 %	46 km/h	0.6 mm	High 33
10 Apr	38.4 °C	24 %	46 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 41
11 Apr after	38.5 °C	29 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
12 Apr after	38.9 °C	27 %	40 km/h	0.2 mm	Very high 41
13 Apr after	30.2 °C	58 %	32 km/h	8.0 mm	Very low 4

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 6 Mar 2020

After · 17 Apr 2020

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.

Detections table · 594Every 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 Pha Oudom fire last?: According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 13 March 2020 to 10 April 2020 (29 days). The perimeter dates it from 20 March 2020 to 3 April 2020.
How much area did it burn?: The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 10,788 hectares (107.9 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 2 municipalities: Pha Oudom (9,152 ha, 5.4 %); Huoixai (1,695 ha, 1.0 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 40.1 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 48 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 46, 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

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