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Saraj fire, July 2017 Општина Сарај · Saraj, Jegunovtse, Zhelino

Out · last detection 6 Aug 2017, 11:28 UTC

The fire started on 31 July 2017 in Saraj, North Macedonia, and satellites saw it burning for 6 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 1,813 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 3 municipalities.

It is the largest fire in Skopje since 2016 (of 31 with a page). Number 2 in North Macedonia in 2017, of 44.

Burnt area
1,813ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
6days
31 Jul 2017 – 5 Aug 2017
Municipalities hit
3
municipalities
Started on
31 Jul
2017
Heat detections
95
in a single hotspot: 51 MW
Danger at start
32
High · FWI index
Energy released
502MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

6 Aug 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 31 Jul5 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

31123456

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

The weather it burned in

35°high
36km/h · peak gust
8%lowest humidity

It had gone 4 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.4 mm on 12 Aug.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Saraj Општина Сарај 38,399 inhabitants · 11.8 km from the town where it started
    1,228 ha reached on 31 Jul
    5.4 %
  2. Jegunovtse Општина Јегуновце 8,895 inhabitants · 4.9 km from the town
    427 ha reached on 4 Aug
    2.4 %
  3. Zhelino Општина Желино 13,645 inhabitants · 14.7 km from the town
    159 ha reached on 4 Aug
    0.8 %

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 land73 %
  • Sclerophyllous scrub19 %
  • Scrub and transitional woodland4.6 %
  • Broadleaved forest2.5 %

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)
31 Jul 32.6 °C 19 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
1 Aug 32.2 °C 14 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
2 Aug 32.8 °C 10 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
3 Aug 33.5 °C 8 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
4 Aug 34.2 °C 11 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
5 Aug 34.6 °C 12 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
6 Aug after 34.4 °C 15 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
7 Aug after 30.3 °C 35 % 32 km/h 0.4 mm High 32
8 Aug after 31.4 °C 30 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
9 Aug after 33.3 °C 17 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
10 Aug after 33.2 °C 20 % 31 km/h 0.2 mm High 36
11 Aug after 34.9 °C 14 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
12 Aug after 33.8 °C 12 % 42 km/h 1.4 mm High 38

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 24 Jul 2017
After · 12 Aug 2017

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 · 95Every 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 North Macedonia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Saraj fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 31 July 2017 and 5 August 2017: 6 days between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 1,813 hectares (18.1 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 3 municipalities: Saraj (1,228 ha, 5.4 %); Jegunovtse (427 ha, 2.4 %); Zhelino (159 ha, 0.8 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 4.9 km of Jegunovtse. That is the distance to the perimeter or nearest hotspot; it does not mean it entered the houses.
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 34.6 °C, humidity dropped to 8 % and gusts hit 36 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 44, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of North Macedonia (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: 193 · 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 193 · 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 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 slightly from each country’s official figure.