How long did the Phrao fire last?

GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 27 March 2024 and 31 March 2024: 5 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 1,364 hectares (13.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 2 municipalities: Phrao (717 ha, 0.6 %); Mae Taeng (654 ha, 0.5 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 39.8 °C, humidity dropped to 19 % and gusts hit 40 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 36, class High.

Where does this data come from?

From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Thailand (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

TH · Thailand · 2024-03-27 → 2024-03-31

Phrao fire, 27 March 2024 พร้าว · Phrao, Mae Taeng

Out · last detection 31 Mar 2024, 07:15 UTC

The fire started on 27 March 2024 in Phrao, Thailand, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 1,364 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 257th largest in Chiang Mai Province since 2016 (of 447 with a page). Number 182 in Thailand in 2024, of 336.

The power measured by the satellite is low (13.4 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.

Burnt area: 1,364ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 5days; 27 Mar 2024 – 31 Mar 2024
Municipalities hit: 2; districts
Started on: 27 Mar; 2024
Heat detections: 61; in a single hotspot: 13 MW
Danger at start: 21; Moderate · FWI index
Average daily power: 41MW; detected power per day, on average

Play back 31 Mar 2024

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 27 Mar31 Mar

How it evolved, day by day

27 Mar 28 Mar 29 Mar 30 Mar 31 Mar

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

40km/h · peak gust

19%lowest humidity

It had gone one day without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.6 mm on 10 Apr.

This area had burned before

89% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 190 ha in 2016, 619 ha in 2017, 284 ha in 2019, 1,170 ha in 2020, 1 ha in 2021, 163 ha in 2023. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 1,208 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

Phrao พร้าว where it started

717 ha reached on 23 Mar

0.6 %
Mae Taeng แม่แตง

654 ha reached on 23 Mar

0.5 %

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)
23 Mar	35.6 °C	29 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 21
24 Mar	36.2 °C	26 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	High 24
25 Mar	37.0 °C	19 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	High 28
26 Mar	37.2 °C	22 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	High 30
27 Mar	37.5 °C	26 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	High 32
28 Mar	38.0 °C	23 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	High 32
29 Mar	38.0 °C	22 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
30 Mar	38.8 °C	23 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
31 Mar	39.8 °C	19 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
1 Apr after	40.2 °C	20 %	43 km/h	0.3 mm	Very high 42
2 Apr after	40.0 °C	21 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38
3 Apr after	40.5 °C	24 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
4 Apr after	41.5 °C	22 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	High 38
5 Apr after	41.2 °C	23 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
6 Apr after	41.3 °C	26 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
7 Apr after	40.7 °C	29 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
8 Apr after	40.7 °C	27 %	32 km/h	0.1 mm	Very high 39
9 Apr after	41.0 °C	27 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 41
10 Apr after	37.1 °C	32 %	33 km/h	1.6 mm	High 22

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 20 Mar 2024

After · 7 Apr 2024

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.

The smoke

CAMS · Copernicus

On 3 April 2024 the air beside the fire reached 47 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 37: 2.5 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak47 µg/m³

Days over the guideline10 days

PM1074 µg/m³

Optical depth1.27

WHO 15

25262728293031123

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 · 61Every 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 Thailand ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Phrao fire last?: GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 27 March 2024 and 31 March 2024: 5 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 1,364 hectares (13.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 2 municipalities: Phrao (717 ha, 0.6 %); Mae Taeng (654 ha, 0.5 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 39.8 °C, humidity dropped to 19 % and gusts hit 40 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 36, class High.
Where does this data come from?: From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Thailand (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.

Emergency number: 199 · 191

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.

Report an error

What do you think is wrong?

Dates or duration Place or towns Burned area Name It was not a wildfire Same fire as another page Something else

What really happened?

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We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy. This is not an emergency service: if there is a fire now, call 199 · 191.

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