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Sambour fire, 13 January 2021 Sambour

Out · last detection 7 Apr 2021, 05:50 UTC

The fire started on 13 January 2021 in Sambour, Cambodia, and satellites saw it burning for 84 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 15,360 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

This page is probably a fire complex, not a single fire. GWIS merges into one perimeter the fires that touch over weeks, which in large burning seasons can join dozens of separate fires. The total area is reliable; the origin and dates refer to the whole complex.

Other fire pages in the same area and on the same dates:

It is the 7th largest in Kratie since 2016 (of 80 with a page). Number 3 in Cambodia in 2021, of 71.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Sambour · 2020Sambour · 2020Sambour · 2018Sambour · 2026

Burnt area
15,360ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
84days
13 Jan 2021 – 6 Apr 2021
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
13 Jan
2021
Heat detections
2,913
in a single hotspot: 224 MW
Danger at start
22
High · FWI index
Average daily power
338MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 13 Jan6 Apr
7 Apr 2021

How it evolved, day by day

13 Jan 2021 · 862 MW · 52 14 Jan 2021 · 35 MW · 5 15 Jan 2021 · 155 MW · 13 16 Jan 2021 · 111 MW · 18 17 Jan 2021 · 67 MW · 17 18 Jan 2021 · 37 MW · 10 19 Jan 2021 · 74 MW · 10 20 Jan 2021 · 16 MW · 10 21 Jan 2021 · 50 MW · 13 22 Jan 2021 · 4 MW · 3 23 Jan 2021 · 3 MW · 1 24 Jan 2021 · 6 MW · 7 25 Jan 2021 · 28 MW · 8 26 Jan 2021 · 346 MW · 29 27 Jan 2021 · 105 MW · 20 28 Jan 2021 · 122 MW · 26 29 Jan 2021 · 131 MW · 17 30 Jan 2021 · 350 MW · 38 31 Jan 2021 · 278 MW · 37 1 Feb 2021 · 446 MW · 47 2 Feb 2021 · 910 MW · 75 3 Feb 2021 · 404 MW · 59 4 Feb 2021 · 2,875 MW · 136 5 Feb 2021 · 1,347 MW · 84 6 Feb 2021 · 222 MW · 46 7 Feb 2021 · 354 MW · 59 8 Feb 2021 · 374 MW · 39 9 Feb 2021 · 10 MW · 1 10 Feb 2021 · 3 MW · 4 11 Feb 2021 · 7 MW · 6 12 Feb 2021 · 41 MW · 12 13 Feb 2021 · 239 MW · 29 14 Feb 2021 · 217 MW · 34 15 Feb 2021 · 307 MW · 54 16 Feb 2021 · 153 MW · 25 17 Feb 2021 · 617 MW · 57 18 Feb 2021 · 916 MW · 99 19 Feb 2021 · 1,719 MW · 101 20 Feb 2021 · 1,115 MW · 98 21 Feb 2021 · 525 MW · 54 22 Feb 2021 · 274 MW · 38 23 Feb 2021 · 143 MW · 23 24 Feb 2021 · 79 MW · 20 25 Feb 2021 · 84 MW · 17 26 Feb 2021 · 212 MW · 31 27 Feb 2021 · 314 MW · 36 28 Feb 2021 · 40 MW · 4 1 Mar 2021 · 186 MW · 10 2 Mar 2021 · 272 MW · 41 3 Mar 2021 · 1,600 MW · 110 4 Mar 2021 · 1,163 MW · 74 5 Mar 2021 · 330 MW · 46 6 Mar 2021 · 342 MW · 47 7 Mar 2021 · 298 MW · 40 8 Mar 2021 · 661 MW · 61 9 Mar 2021 · 223 MW · 49 10 Mar 2021 · 225 MW · 34 11 Mar 2021 · 117 MW · 23 12 Mar 2021 · 200 MW · 27 13 Mar 2021 · 2,474 MW · 87 14 Mar 2021 · 351 MW · 50 15 Mar 2021 · 111 MW · 21 16 Mar 2021 · 23 MW · 12 17 Mar 2021 · 9 MW · 4 18 Mar 2021 · 81 MW · 14 19 Mar 2021 · 22 MW · 6 20 Mar 2021 · 30 MW · 5 21 Mar 2021 · 29 MW · 15 22 Mar 2021 · 519 MW · 58 23 Mar 2021 · 617 MW · 56 24 Mar 2021 · 83 MW · 29 25 Mar 2021 · 402 MW · 27 26 Mar 2021 · 57 MW · 6 27 Mar 2021 · 67 MW · 15 28 Mar 2021 · 68 MW · 19 29 Mar 2021 · 338 MW · 31 30 Mar 2021 · 194 MW · 22 31 Mar 2021 · 494 MW · 31 1 Apr 2021 · 37 MW · 7 2 Apr 2021 · 191 MW · 14 3 Apr 2021 · 24 MW · 12 4 Apr 2021 · 52 MW · 10 5 Apr 2021 · 13 MW · 8 6 Apr 2021 · 41 MW · 7 7 Apr 2021 · 34 MW · 6
13 Jan 26 Jan 4 Feb 8 Feb 21 Feb 6 Mar 19 Mar 1 Apr

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

The weather it burned in

37°high
51km/h · peak gust
31%lowest humidity

It had gone 20 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 3.6 mm on 8 Apr.

This area had burned before

54% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 640 ha in 2016, 2,079 ha in 2018, 671 ha in 2019, 10,945 ha in 2020. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 8,218 ha that had burned before.

How big is it?

10 km
It burned the equivalent of 9.7% of the area of London (154 km² against 1,583 km²).

London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).

This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.

What happened to each town

  1. Sambour where it started
    15,454 ha
    2.9 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS 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.

People and buildings inside the perimeter

GHSL 2020
Built-up area< 0.1 ha
Residents< 20

Inside the perimeter there was no noticeable built-up land and almost nobody lived there (GHSL 2020, 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.

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)
13 Jan 28.5 °C 37 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
14 Jan 30.5 °C 40 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
15 Jan 32.3 °C 35 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 21
16 Jan 32.3 °C 31 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
17 Jan 30.9 °C 37 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
18 Jan 29.9 °C 36 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
19 Jan 29.6 °C 41 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
20 Jan 31.4 °C 40 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
21 Jan 32.4 °C 42 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
22 Jan 32.1 °C 44 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
23 Jan 32.9 °C 46 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 21
24 Jan 31.9 °C 56 % 21 km/h 1.0 mm Low 11
25 Jan 34.2 °C 43 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19
26 Jan 33.7 °C 40 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
27 Jan 34.1 °C 39 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
28 Jan 33.5 °C 42 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
29 Jan 32.2 °C 37 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
30 Jan 32.5 °C 32 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
31 Jan 33.1 °C 38 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
1 Feb 32.7 °C 40 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
2 Feb 33.0 °C 38 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
3 Feb 33.5 °C 32 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
4 Feb 32.7 °C 36 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
5 Feb 33.9 °C 39 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
6 Feb 33.6 °C 36 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
7 Feb 33.6 °C 42 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
8 Feb 34.0 °C 46 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
9 Feb 32.2 °C 56 % 29 km/h 0.3 mm High 24
10 Feb 30.5 °C 57 % 27 km/h 1.3 mm Low 11
11 Feb 33.0 °C 41 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 21
12 Feb 33.2 °C 36 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
13 Feb 32.8 °C 34 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
14 Feb 32.3 °C 39 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
15 Feb 32.3 °C 42 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
16 Feb 32.2 °C 43 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
17 Feb 33.1 °C 34 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
18 Feb 32.8 °C 36 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
19 Feb 33.4 °C 35 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
20 Feb 32.6 °C 34 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
21 Feb 33.1 °C 34 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
22 Feb 33.2 °C 35 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
23 Feb 33.8 °C 41 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
24 Feb 33.1 °C 45 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
25 Feb 34.2 °C 44 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
26 Feb 34.3 °C 47 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
27 Feb 34.3 °C 50 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
28 Feb 33.7 °C 50 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
1 Mar 34.9 °C 47 % 22 km/h 0.1 mm High 25
2 Mar 35.8 °C 47 % 27 km/h 1.7 mm Moderate 14
3 Mar 36.1 °C 37 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
4 Mar 36.1 °C 42 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
5 Mar 35.3 °C 45 % 15 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
6 Mar 35.6 °C 39 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
7 Mar 35.8 °C 35 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
8 Mar 33.5 °C 47 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
9 Mar 35.7 °C 33 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
10 Mar 35.2 °C 35 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
11 Mar 35.8 °C 37 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
12 Mar 36.1 °C 33 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
13 Mar 35.2 °C 35 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
14 Mar 34.4 °C 40 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
15 Mar 34.1 °C 44 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
16 Mar 33.5 °C 50 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
17 Mar 32.9 °C 52 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
18 Mar 35.0 °C 43 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
19 Mar 33.9 °C 51 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
20 Mar 35.7 °C 46 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
21 Mar 34.4 °C 50 % 27 km/h 1.9 mm Moderate 13
22 Mar 36.0 °C 34 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
23 Mar 36.7 °C 33 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
24 Mar 36.2 °C 39 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
25 Mar 36.0 °C 38 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
26 Mar 36.8 °C 36 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
27 Mar 36.6 °C 40 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
28 Mar 36.5 °C 42 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
29 Mar 35.8 °C 45 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
30 Mar 36.3 °C 44 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
31 Mar 36.5 °C 42 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
1 Apr 35.2 °C 45 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
2 Apr 37.0 °C 45 % 28 km/h 1.5 mm High 21
3 Apr 35.4 °C 52 % 20 km/h 2.3 mm Low 11
4 Apr 36.9 °C 43 % 28 km/h 0.5 mm High 23
5 Apr 36.5 °C 34 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
6 Apr 36.7 °C 34 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
7 Apr after 36.7 °C 36 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
8 Apr after 33.1 °C 54 % 26 km/h 3.6 mm Low 7

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 6 Jan 2021
After · 13 Apr 2021

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 · 2,913Every 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 Cambodia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Sambour fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 13 January 2021 and 6 April 2021: 84 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 15,360 hectares (153.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Sambour (15,454 ha, 2.9 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 37.0 °C, humidity dropped to 31 % and gusts hit 51 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 39, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Cambodia (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

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.

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How we know this
  • Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery; 5 polygons grouped in this page.
  • Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 2,913 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 2020, 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 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 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)). 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.