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Posušje fire, February 2020 Posušje, Tomislavgrad

Out · last detection 23 Feb 2020, 12:12 UTC

The fire started on 23 February 2020 in Posušje, Bosnia & Herzegovina, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 167 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 351th largest in Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina since 2016 (of 520 with a page). Number 120 in Bosnia & Herzegovina in 2020, of 183.

The power measured by the satellite is low (9.2 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
167ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
2days
23 Feb 2020 – 24 Feb 2020
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
23 Feb
2020
Heat detections
3
in a single hotspot: 9 MW
Danger at start
3
Very low · FWI index
Energy released
18MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 23 Feb24 Feb

How it evolved, day by day

23

Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.

The weather it burned in

12°high
30km/h · peak gust
43%lowest humidity

It had gone 8 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 13.1 mm on 26 Feb.

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

  1. Posušje where it started
    108 ha reached on 23 Feb
    0.2 %
  2. Tomislavgrad
    59 ha reached on 23 Feb
    0.1 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the official 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.

What burned

  • Other natural land61 %
  • Agricultural areas39 %

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

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 Feb 10.5 °C 43 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very low 3
24 Feb 11.7 °C 47 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very low 3
25 Feb after 11.9 °C 55 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very low 3
26 Feb after 9.4 °C 68 % 46 km/h 13.1 mm Very low 0

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 16 Feb 2020
After · 2 Mar 2020

If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.

Detections table · 3Every 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 timeSatelliteFRP (MW)LatLon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Bosnia & Herzegovina ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Posušje fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 23 February 2020 and 24 February 2020: 2 days between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 167 hectares (1.7 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Posušje (108 ha, 0.2 %); Tomislavgrad (59 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 11.7 °C, humidity dropped to 43 % and gusts hit 30 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 3, class Very low.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Bosnia & Herzegovina (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: 123 · 112

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
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 123 · 112.

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 ADM3 (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.