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Popasna fire, 13 August 2026 Попаснянський район · Popasna, Slovianoserbsk

Out · last measured on 22 Aug 2026

The fire started on 13 August 2026 in Popasna, Ukraine, and satellites saw it burning for 10 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 138 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 653th largest in Luhansk Oblast since 2016 (of 909 with a page). Number 689 in Ukraine in 2026, of 984.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Slovianoserbsk · 2023Slovianoserbsk · 2025Slovianoserbsk · 2024Novoaidar · 2020

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
138ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
10days
13 Aug 2026 – 22 Aug 2026
Municipalities hit
2
districts
Started on
13 Aug
2026
Danger at start
20
Moderate · FWI index

Where it burned

The weather it burned in

34°high
41km/h · peak gust
20%lowest humidity

It had gone 0 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

66% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 61 ha in 2023, 30 ha in 2024.

What happened to each town

  1. Popasna Попаснянський район 40,204 inhabitants · 23.9 km from the centre where it started
    88 ha
    0.0 %
  2. Slovianoserbsk Слов'яносербський район 53,784 inhabitants · 26.7 km from the centre
    49 ha
    0.0 %

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

  • Agricultural areas64 %
  • Other natural land25 %
  • Mixed forest10 %

Land cover inside the perimeter as reported by Copernicus EFFIS (outside the Corine Land Cover area).

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 Aug 22.5 °C 32 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
14 Aug 21.5 °C 34 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
15 Aug 23.0 °C 33 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
16 Aug 28.1 °C 27 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19
17 Aug 29.8 °C 29 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
18 Aug 31.8 °C 20 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
19 Aug 28.9 °C 37 % 35 km/h 0.2 mm High 29
20 Aug 27.5 °C 30 % 26 km/h 0.3 mm High 24
21 Aug 31.6 °C 27 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
22 Aug 33.7 °C 25 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
23 Aug after 33.5 °C 17 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
24 Aug after 26.7 °C 27 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
25 Aug after 25.6 °C 27 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
26 Aug after 27.4 °C 29 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
27 Aug after 20.9 °C 49 % 32 km/h 0.1 mm High 24
28 Aug after 24.5 °C 45 % 49 km/h 0.5 mm High 30
29 Aug after 27.7 °C 30 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
30 Aug after 26.4 °C 26 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
31 Aug after 26.7 °C 16 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
1 Sept after 27.8 °C 17 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 34

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 6 Aug 2026
After · 29 Aug 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 12 August 2026 the air beside the fire reached 21 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak21 µg/m³
Days over the guideline0 days
PM1027 µg/m³
Optical depth0.47
111213141516
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 Ukraine ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Popasna fire last?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 13 August 2026 to 22 August 2026 (10 days). The perimeter dates it from 13 August 2026 to 13 August 2026.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 138 hectares (1.4 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Popasna (88 ha, 0.0 %); Slovianoserbsk (49 ha, 0.0 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The fire started in Popasna and came within 23.9 km of its centre. That is the distance from the perimeter, or the nearest hotspot, to the point marking the centre; it does not mean it entered the houses.
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 33.7 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 41 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 29, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Ukraine (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: 101 · 112 · Emergency number and official warnings ›

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.

RSS Changes to this page

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 101 · 112.

How we know this
  • Perimeter: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
  • Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 13 August 2026 to 13 August 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.

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 ADM2 (Public Domain). 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.