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Sangkae fire, April 2019 Sangkae, Moung Ruessei, Bakan

Out · last detection 6 May 2019, 06:53 UTC

The fire started on 15 April 2019 in Sangkae, Cambodia, and satellites saw it burning for 22 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 25,741 hectares from heat detections, spread across 4 municipalities.

It is the 2th largest in Battambang since 2016 (of 26 with a page). The largest in Cambodia in 2019, of 65.

Burnt area
25,741ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
22days
15 Apr 2019 – 6 May 2019
Municipalities hit
4
districts
Started on
15 Apr
2019
Heat detections
1,487
in a single hotspot: 195 MW
Danger at start
6
Low · FWI index
Energy released
21.5GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

6 May 2019
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 15 Apr6 May

How it evolved, day by day

15161718192021222324252627282930123456

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

The weather it burned in

41°high
37km/h · peak gust
34%lowest humidity

It had gone 0 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.3 mm on 7 May.

This area had burned before

68% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 18,975 ha in 2016, 210 ha in 2018. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 17,399 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Sangkae where it started
    11,091 ha reached on 10 Apr
    9.4 %
  2. Moung Ruessei
    10,142 ha reached on 11 Apr
    7.1 %
  3. Bakan
    3,475 ha reached on 13 Apr
    2.2 %
  4. Aek Phnum
    1,197 ha reached on 12 Apr
    1.1 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS 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.

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)
15 Apr 37.7 °C 47 % 24 km/h 1.7 mm Low 6
16 Apr 37.4 °C 49 % 22 km/h 1.5 mm Low 8
17 Apr 38.2 °C 48 % 27 km/h 11.6 mm Very low 2
18 Apr 37.5 °C 51 % 28 km/h 0.1 mm Low 7
19 Apr 38.9 °C 44 % 33 km/h 0.3 mm Moderate 13
20 Apr 39.8 °C 41 % 31 km/h 1.2 mm Moderate 13
21 Apr 39.3 °C 41 % 30 km/h 0.4 mm Moderate 15
22 Apr 38.0 °C 46 % 31 km/h 1.3 mm Moderate 12
23 Apr 38.1 °C 44 % 21 km/h 0.4 mm Moderate 14
24 Apr 39.2 °C 41 % 24 km/h 0.2 mm Moderate 18
25 Apr 39.1 °C 42 % 31 km/h 1.8 mm Moderate 13
26 Apr 38.6 °C 44 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
27 Apr 37.9 °C 45 % 23 km/h 1.7 mm Low 11
28 Apr 39.2 °C 38 % 22 km/h 0.3 mm Moderate 19
29 Apr 39.0 °C 39 % 27 km/h 0.8 mm Moderate 20
30 Apr 38.5 °C 39 % 30 km/h 5.0 mm Low 8
1 May 39.9 °C 37 % 35 km/h 2.4 mm Moderate 14
2 May 40.4 °C 37 % 35 km/h 1.0 mm Moderate 18
3 May 40.6 °C 36 % 24 km/h 2.1 mm Moderate 16
4 May 40.3 °C 34 % 36 km/h 7.3 mm Low 10
5 May 39.1 °C 43 % 31 km/h 0.5 mm Moderate 17
6 May 38.6 °C 43 % 37 km/h 3.9 mm Low 8
7 May after 37.7 °C 47 % 23 km/h 1.3 mm Low 10

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 8 Apr 2019
After · 13 May 2019

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 · 1,487Every 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 Sangkae fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 15 April 2019 and 6 May 2019: 22 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 25,741 hectares (257.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 4 municipalities: Sangkae (11,091 ha, 9.4 %); Moung Ruessei (10,142 ha, 7.1 %); Bakan (3,475 ha, 2.2 %); Aek Phnum (1,197 ha, 1.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 40.6 °C, humidity dropped to 34 % and gusts hit 37 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 20, class Moderate.
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

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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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.