Samsat fire, October 2020 Samsat
The fire started on 10 October 2020 in Samsat, Türkiye, and satellites saw it burning for 3 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 396 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 7th largest in Adıyaman since 2016 (of 40 with a page). Number 50 in Türkiye in 2020, of 212.
Compare with…
We have the Copernicus perimeter for this fire, but the VIIRS sensors did not capture it in enough detail: no day-by-day evolution, but the split by municipality is there.
- Burnt area
- 396ha
- Copernicus perimeter
- Duration
- 3days
- 10 Oct 2020 – 12 Oct 2020
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- districts
- Started on
- 10 Oct
- 2020
- Danger at start
- 42
- Very high · FWI index
Where it burned
The weather it burned in
It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.
What happened to each town
-
396 ha reached on 5 Oct1.2 %
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 areas93 %
- Other natural land6.8 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10 Oct | 29.0 °C | 15 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 11 Oct | 29.9 °C | 13 % | 21 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 12 Oct | 30.9 °C | 15 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 13 Oct after | 31.6 °C | 15 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 14 Oct after | 31.7 °C | 14 % | 20 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 15 Oct after | 31.6 °C | 16 % | 16 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 16 Oct after | 30.7 °C | 20 % | 17 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 17 Oct after | 29.4 °C | 22 % | 16 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 18 Oct after | 28.7 °C | 19 % | 17 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 38 |
| 19 Oct after | 28.7 °C | 25 % | 20 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 38 |
| 20 Oct after | 29.0 °C | 27 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 21 Oct after | 29.0 °C | 25 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
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 13 October 2020 the air beside the fire reached 30 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 26: 1.7 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)
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Samsat fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 10 October 2020 to 12 October 2020 (3 days). The perimeter dates it from 10 October 2020 to 11 October 2020.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 396 hectares (4.0 km²). Official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Samsat (396 ha, 1.2 %).
- Did the fire reach a town?
- The fire started in Samsat and came within 9.6 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 29.9 °C, humidity dropped to 13 % and gusts hit 23 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 42, class Very high.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Türkiye (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: 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.
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: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
- Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 10 October 2020 to 11 October 2020. 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.
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 (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.