Phiang fire, 31 March 2026 Phiang
The fire started on 31 March 2026 in Phiang, Laos, and satellites saw it burning for 22 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 11,280 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 13th largest in Xaignabouli since 2016 (of 161 with a page). Number 35 in Laos in 2026, of 308.
The power measured by the satellite is low (23.4 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.
Compare with…
- Burnt area
- 11,280ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 22days
- 31 Mar 2026 – 21 Apr 2026
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- districts
- Started on
- 31 Mar
- 2026
- Heat detections
- 245
- in a single hotspot: 23 MW
- Danger at start
- 22
- High · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 43MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone 20 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 19.0 mm on 19 Apr.
This area had burned before
53% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 688 ha in 2016, 742 ha in 2019, 1,749 ha in 2020, 189 ha in 2021, 3,816 ha in 2023, 356 ha in 2024, 625 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 5,974 ha that had burned before.
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
Berlin boundary: geoBoundaries · Federal Agency for Cartography and Geodesy (dl-de/by-2-0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
Phiang where it started11,356 ha reached on 31 Mar4.0 %
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.
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 7 Apr | 34.8 °C | 39 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 8 Apr | 35.9 °C | 28 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 9 Apr | 36.0 °C | 28 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 10 Apr | 35.6 °C | 26 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 11 Apr | 35.5 °C | 30 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 12 Apr | 36.0 °C | 27 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 13 Apr | 36.3 °C | 30 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 14 Apr | 36.3 °C | 31 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 15 Apr | 36.7 °C | 28 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 16 Apr | 37.1 °C | 21 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 17 Apr | 35.5 °C | 32 % | 21 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 18 Apr | 33.5 °C | 44 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 19 Apr | 29.7 °C | 67 % | 36 km/h | 19.0 mm | Very low 1 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
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 · CopernicusOn 18 April 2026 the air beside the fire reached 166 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 134: 8.9 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
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 · 245Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 12,097 haXayabury20 March 2026 · 34 days · 10 km away
- 8,243 haPhiang4 April 2017 · 9 days · 27 km away
- 20,323 haPhiang9 March 2019 · 34 days · 29 km away
- 13,215 haPhiang16 March 2020 · 22 days · 34 km away
- 11,286 haPhiang20 March 2026 · 34 days · 36 km away
- 8,385 haPhiang28 March 2026 · 25 days · 40 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Phiang fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 31 March 2026 to 21 April 2026 (22 days). The perimeter dates it from 7 April 2026 to 17 April 2026.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 11,280 hectares (112.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Phiang (11,356 ha, 4.0 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 37.1 °C, humidity dropped to 21 % and gusts hit 34 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 32, 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.
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.
Report an error
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 7 April 2026 to 17 April 2026. 245 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.
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.