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Saw fire, 1 April 2024 Kanpetlet, Saw, Mindat

Out · last detection 8 Apr 2024, 18:54 UTC

The fire started on 1 April 2024 in Saw, Myanmar (Burma), and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,511 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.

It is the 43th largest in Magway since 2016 (of 189 with a page). Number 43 in Myanmar (Burma) in 2024, of 161.

Burnt area
4,511ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
7days
1 Apr 2024 – 7 Apr 2024
Municipalities hit
3
municipalities
Started on
1 Apr
2024
Heat detections
295
in a single hotspot: 70 MW
Danger at start
21
High · FWI index
Energy released
1.8GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

8 Apr 2024
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 1 Apr7 Apr

How it evolved, day by day

12345678

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

The weather it burned in

39°high
56km/h · peak gust
24%lowest humidity

It had gone 10 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

82% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,679 ha in 2016, 1,089 ha in 2017, 49 ha in 2018, 3,096 ha in 2019, 2,401 ha in 2021, 124 ha in 2022, 937 ha in 2023. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,687 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Kanpetlet
    1,975 ha reached on 1 Apr
    0.8 %
  2. Saw where it started
    1,702 ha reached on 25 Mar
    1.0 %
  3. Mindat
    861 ha reached on 26 Mar
    0.3 %

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)
1 Apr 33.4 °C 33 % 56 km/h 1.0 mm High 21
2 Apr 35.0 °C 34 % 50 km/h 0.4 mm High 26
3 Apr 37.3 °C 28 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
4 Apr 38.3 °C 24 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
5 Apr 36.9 °C 30 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
6 Apr 39.1 °C 27 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
7 Apr 37.1 °C 29 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
8 Apr after 37.5 °C 27 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
9 Apr after 38.1 °C 23 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
10 Apr after 37.7 °C 25 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
11 Apr after 36.8 °C 24 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
12 Apr after 35.2 °C 31 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
13 Apr after 35.8 °C 30 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
14 Apr after 36.6 °C 29 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
15 Apr after 36.1 °C 35 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
16 Apr after 37.2 °C 30 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
17 Apr after 35.1 °C 39 % 34 km/h 0.3 mm High 30

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 25 Mar 2024
After · 14 Apr 2024

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 · Copernicus

On 7 April 2024 the air beside the fire reached 124 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 72: 4.8 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak124 µg/m³
Days over the guideline12 days
PM10183 µg/m³
Optical depth2.45
303112345678910
Good Fair Moderate Poor Very poor Extremely poor

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 · 295Every 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 Myanmar (Burma) ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Saw fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 1 April 2024 and 7 April 2024: 7 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 4,511 hectares (45.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 3 municipalities: Kanpetlet (1,975 ha, 0.8 %); Saw (1,702 ha, 1.0 %); Mindat (861 ha, 0.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 39.1 °C, humidity dropped to 24 % and gusts hit 56 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 32, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Myanmar (Burma) (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 ADM3 (Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 (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.