Phookood fire, 21 March 2025 Phookood, Kham, Pek
The fire started on 21 March 2025 in Phookood, Laos, and satellites saw it burning for 10 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 11,637 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.
It is the 6th largest in Xiangkhouang since 2016 (of 107 with a page). The largest in Laos in 2025, of 51.
- Burnt area
- 11,637ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 10days
- 21 Mar 2025 – 30 Mar 2025
- Municipalities hit
- 3
- districts
- Started on
- 21 Mar
- 2025
- Heat detections
- 445
- in a single hotspot: 315 MW
- Danger at start
- 14
- Moderate · FWI index
- Energy released
- 12.8GW
- sum of detected power
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 8 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 5.6 mm on 5 Apr.
This area had burned before
81% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,679 ha in 2016, 371 ha in 2017, 919 ha in 2018, 1,313 ha in 2019, 873 ha in 2020, 2,099 ha in 2021, 2,507 ha in 2022, 8,991 ha in 2023, 4,072 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 9,475 ha that had burned before.
- 5,278 ha Phookood fire, March 2023 23,228 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,030 ha Phookood fire, April 2022 3,337 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,820 ha Phookood fire, March 2024 4,396 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,370 ha Phookood fire, March 2024 2,710 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 520 ha Phookood fire, March 2019 2,728 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Phookood where it started10,851 ha reached on 21 Mar4.3 %
-
529 ha reached on 24 Mar0.2 %
-
332 ha reached on 23 Mar0.3 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 21 Mar | 26.7 °C | 38 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 14 |
| 22 Mar | 28.9 °C | 41 % | 18 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 15 |
| 23 Mar | 30.7 °C | 39 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 17 |
| 24 Mar | 32.4 °C | 30 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 25 Mar | 30.9 °C | 39 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 26 Mar | 30.8 °C | 41 % | 43 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 27 Mar | 32.2 °C | 30 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 28 Mar | 32.9 °C | 31 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 23 |
| 29 Mar | 31.1 °C | 50 % | 32 km/h | 0.7 mm | Moderate 16 |
| 30 Mar | 26.7 °C | 61 % | 29 km/h | 1.2 mm | Low 8 |
| 31 Mar after | 27.7 °C | 53 % | 27 km/h | 0.4 mm | Moderate 12 |
| 1 Apr after | 23.9 °C | 57 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 13 |
| 2 Apr after | 24.8 °C | 54 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 13 |
| 3 Apr after | 27.6 °C | 48 % | 19 km/h | 0.2 mm | Moderate 15 |
| 4 Apr after | 30.8 °C | 45 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 19 |
| 5 Apr after | 29.8 °C | 52 % | 33 km/h | 5.6 mm | Very low 3 |
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 27 March 2025 the air beside the fire reached 227 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 120: 8.0 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 · 445Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Phookood fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 21 March 2025 and 30 March 2025: 10 days between the first and last heat detection of the perimeter.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 11,637 hectares (116.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 3 municipalities: Phookood (10,851 ha, 4.3 %); Kham (529 ha, 0.2 %); Pek (332 ha, 0.3 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 32.9 °C, humidity dropped to 30 % and gusts hit 44 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 26, 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
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
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.