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Pljevlja Municipality fire, March 2026 Pljevlja Municipality

Out · last measured on 14 Mar 2026

The fire started on 1 March 2026 in Pljevlja Municipality, Montenegro, and satellites saw it burning for 14 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 100 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.

Number 52 in Montenegro in 2026, of 53.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Podgorica Municipality · 2024Podgorica Municipality · 2024Pljevlja Municipality · 2021Plužine Municipality · 2026

We have the Copernicus perimeter for this fire, but not yet its hotspots: NASA publishes the yearly hotspot archive only once the year closes. The page picks it up automatically when it is available.

Burnt area
100ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
14days
1 Mar 2026 – 14 Mar 2026
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
1 Mar
2026
Danger at start
2
Very low · FWI index

Where it burned

The weather it burned in

15°high
30km/h · peak gust
36%lowest humidity

It had gone 4 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 16.4 mm on 17 Mar.

This area had burned before

30% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 14 ha in 2020, 4 ha in 2021, 7 ha in 2022, 14 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 30 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Pljevlja Municipality where it started
    100 ha
    0.1 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the official 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.

What burned

  • Scrub and transitional woodland58 %
  • Broadleaved forest42 %

Land cover inside the perimeter according to Corine Land Cover, as reported by Copernicus.

People and buildings inside the perimeter

GHSL 2025
Built-up area< 0.1 ha
Residents< 20

Inside the perimeter there was no noticeable built-up land and almost nobody lived there (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)
1 Mar 14.8 °C 42 % 18 km/h 0.0 mm Very low 2
2 Mar 11.0 °C 56 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very low 3
3 Mar 12.0 °C 56 % 17 km/h 0.0 mm Very low 2
4 Mar 11.8 °C 57 % 27 km/h 2.1 mm Very low 2
5 Mar 10.1 °C 56 % 30 km/h 4.4 mm Very low 0
6 Mar 13.0 °C 43 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very low 0
7 Mar 14.1 °C 36 % 18 km/h 0.0 mm Very low 0
8 Mar 12.5 °C 49 % 23 km/h 0.6 mm Very low 1
9 Mar 11.8 °C 52 % 19 km/h 1.1 mm Very low 1
10 Mar 12.7 °C 50 % 20 km/h 0.8 mm Very low 1
11 Mar 13.4 °C 41 % 24 km/h 0.2 mm Very low 2
12 Mar 13.7 °C 40 % 16 km/h 0.0 mm Very low 2
13 Mar 13.2 °C 43 % 17 km/h 0.5 mm Very low 3
14 Mar 13.3 °C 41 % 27 km/h 0.5 mm Low 5
15 Mar after 12.6 °C 39 % 23 km/h 0.3 mm Very low 4
16 Mar after 12.4 °C 45 % 17 km/h 0.0 mm Very low 4
17 Mar after 5.5 °C 72 % 28 km/h 16.4 mm Very low 0

Its twins: fires that started in the same weather

It started with an FWI of 2.1, a minimum humidity of 42% and 4 days without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2016: 21.

FWI at the start 2.1
Minimum humidity 42 %
Days without rain 4
this fire chosen twins rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar

Outlines of the closest twins

Podgorica Municipality fire, February 2024
113 ha 1 day FWI 0.7 Min. humidity 42 % 87 km away, in 2024

First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 16.8 mm on 23 Feb.

See its page Compare with this fire

What happened to them

2 days
median duration
185 ha
median area
10 %
went past 1,000 ha
10.1 mm
rain at the end (median; 17 of 21 had it)

It stayed below its twins: 100 ha against a median of 185 ha. It lasted 14 days, against 2 days.

In 4 of 21, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 10.1 mm.

This is a bank of analogues: it shows what usually happens, not what will happen. With fewer than 15 twins we give no figures. How we calculate it

How it ended

16.4 mmfirst rain
17 Mar3 days after it ended
30km/h · max. gust

It was considered over on 14 Mar, and on 17 Mar 16.4 mm fell. We do not know whether the rain or the firefighters put it out. Twins with rain when they ended: 17 of 21, with a median of 10.1 mm.

Weather on this page: Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)

How a twin is chosen

  • Same area: fires that have already ended, less than 250 km from this one, since 2016.
  • Same start: we compare the FWI on the first day, the minimum humidity that day and the run of days without rain before it. The slider sets how much they may differ.
  • Only pages with final weather data (ERA5 reanalysis) calculated in the same way as this fire’s; agricultural and grass burns and pages with data under review are left out.
  • Fires burning at the same time as this one (a week before or after) are left out: they share the same spell of weather and do not count as a precedent.
  • They are sorted by similarity, and the outlines of the first five are drawn.

How we calculate it

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 22 Feb 2026
After · 21 Mar 2026

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 March 2026 the air beside the fire reached 36 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 23: 1.6 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak36 µg/m³
Days over the guideline5 days
PM1043 µg/m³
Optical depth0.67
27 Feb1 Mar3 Mar
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)

Other fires nearby

All fires in Montenegro

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Pljevlja Municipality fire last?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 1 March 2026 to 14 March 2026 (14 days). The perimeter dates it from 1 March 2026 to 1 March 2026.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 100 hectares (1.0 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Pljevlja Municipality (100 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 14.8 °C, humidity dropped to 36 % and gusts hit 30 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 5, class Low.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Montenegro (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.
How did the fires that started in similar weather in this area end?
Fires less than 250 km away that started since 2016 with a similar FWI, humidity and dry spell: 21. Their median duration was 2 days and their median area 185 ha; 10 % went past 1,000 ha. In 4 of 21, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 10.1 mm.

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: 112 · 123 · Emergency number and official warnings

Satellite cross-check

History of this page · 1 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
  1. Last day with fire: 1 March 2026 → 14 March 2026.

RSS Changes to this page With cross-checks and a citable version

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?

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 112 · 123.

How we know this
  • Perimeter: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
  • Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 1 March 2026 to 1 March 2026. No 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 and land cover come from the Copernicus European Forest Fire Information System (EFFIS), measured on MODIS and Sentinel-2 imagery and published under CC BY 4.0. 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 ADM1 (Open Data Commons Open Database License 1.0). The area per municipality is computed by WorldFires by crossing the perimeter with those boundaries, so it may differ slightly from each country’s official figure.