Sambour fire, 8 January 2026 Sambour, Kaoh Nheaek
The fire started on 8 January 2026 in Sambour, Cambodia, and satellites saw it burning for 19 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,956 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.
It is the 24th largest in Kratie since 2016 (of 80 with a page). Number 28 in Cambodia in 2026, of 120.
Compare with…
- Burnt area
- 4,956ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 19days
- 8 Jan 2026 – 26 Jan 2026
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- districts
- Started on
- 8 Jan
- 2026
- Heat detections
- 194
- in a single hotspot: 65 MW
- Danger at start
- 23
- High · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 84MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone 34 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
72% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 188 ha in 2017, 4 ha in 2018, 1,627 ha in 2019, 1,258 ha in 2021, 1,023 ha in 2022, 1,657 ha in 2024, 249 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,574 ha that had burned before.
- 1,604 ha Sambour fire, December 2019 2,357 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,258 ha Sambour fire, January 2021 2,433 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 188 ha Sambour fire, February 2017 3,060 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 23 ha Sambour fire, December 2019 5,274 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 4 ha Sambour fire, December 2018 3,100 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
Berlin boundary: geoBoundaries · Federal Agency for Cartography and Geodesy (dl-de/by-2-0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
Sambour where it started4,619 ha0.8 %
-
370 ha0.1 %
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 2025Inside 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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 8 Jan | 28.9 °C | 39 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 23 |
| 9 Jan | 28.5 °C | 33 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 10 Jan | 29.7 °C | 31 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 11 Jan | 30.7 °C | 38 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 23 |
| 12 Jan | 31.8 °C | 40 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 23 |
| 13 Jan | 31.8 °C | 43 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 14 Jan | 32.8 °C | 39 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 15 Jan | 33.2 °C | 41 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 16 Jan | 33.5 °C | 37 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 17 Jan | 33.3 °C | 38 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 18 Jan | 32.0 °C | 45 % | 22 km/h | 0.2 mm | High 21 |
| 19 Jan | 32.8 °C | 36 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 23 |
| 20 Jan | 32.5 °C | 38 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 21 Jan | 32.1 °C | 33 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 22 Jan | 32.1 °C | 32 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 23 Jan | 32.0 °C | 33 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 24 Jan | 32.4 °C | 35 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 25 Jan | 32.4 °C | 33 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 26 Jan | 32.4 °C | 36 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 27 Jan after | 32.4 °C | 37 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 28 Jan after | 32.7 °C | 37 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 29 Jan after | 33.3 °C | 33 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 30 Jan after | 33.2 °C | 36 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 31 Jan after | 32.8 °C | 39 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 1 Feb after | 33.1 °C | 31 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 2 Feb after | 32.8 °C | 37 % | 47 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 3 Feb after | 32.5 °C | 42 % | 48 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 4 Feb after | 34.1 °C | 36 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 5 Feb after | 34.9 °C | 38 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
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 · CopernicusOn 25 January 2026 the air beside the fire reached 38 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 24: 1.6 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
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 · 194Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 11,343 haKaoh NheaekMarch 2018 · 38 days · 20 km away
- 7,346 haSambour15 February 2020 · 19 days · 21 km away
- 18,577 haSambour22 January 2016 · 88 days · 22 km away
- 13,299 haSambour14 January 2026 · 16 days · 28 km away
- 53,620 haKaoh Nheaek1 January 2026 · 35 days · 32 km away
- 7,184 haKoun MomFebruary 2026 · 10 days · 35 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Sambour fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 8 January 2026 and 26 January 2026: 19 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 4,956 hectares (49.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Sambour (4,619 ha, 0.8 %); Kaoh Nheaek (370 ha, 0.1 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 33.5 °C, humidity dropped to 31 % and gusts hit 44 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 29, class 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.
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
How we know this
- Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery.
- Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 194 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.
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.