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Sesan fire, 5 February 2017 Sesan

Out · last detection 15 Mar 2017, 06:15 UTC

The fire started on 5 February 2017 in Sesan, Cambodia, and satellites saw it burning for 38 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 17,221 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 4th largest in Stung Treng since 2016 (of 130 with a page). The largest in Cambodia in 2017, of 57.

Burnt area
17,221ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
38days
5 Feb 2017 – 14 Mar 2017
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
5 Feb
2017
Heat detections
2,695
in a single hotspot: 136 MW
Danger at start
22
High · FWI index
Energy released
14.4GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

15 Mar 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 5 Feb14 Mar

How it evolved, day by day

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

The weather it burned in

38°high
46km/h · peak gust
20%lowest humidity

It had gone 2 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 7.9 mm on 15 Mar.

This area had burned before

49% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 13,374 ha in 2016. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 8,471 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Sesan where it started
    17,323 ha reached on 29 Jan
    6.4 %

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)
5 Feb 34.9 °C 28 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
6 Feb 34.7 °C 22 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
7 Feb 35.5 °C 20 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
8 Feb 35.6 °C 26 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
9 Feb 36.4 °C 21 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
10 Feb 35.2 °C 32 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
11 Feb 35.3 °C 26 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
12 Feb 33.4 °C 28 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
13 Feb 33.0 °C 26 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
14 Feb 34.3 °C 28 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
15 Feb 33.9 °C 28 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
16 Feb 33.9 °C 24 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
17 Feb 34.5 °C 23 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
18 Feb 35.0 °C 29 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
19 Feb 35.2 °C 30 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
20 Feb 35.9 °C 35 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
21 Feb 36.7 °C 39 % 23 km/h 0.9 mm Moderate 21
22 Feb 36.4 °C 40 % 22 km/h 1.7 mm Moderate 14
23 Feb 36.1 °C 39 % 21 km/h 11.3 mm Very low 4
24 Feb 37.8 °C 29 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
25 Feb 35.5 °C 40 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
26 Feb 35.8 °C 34 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
27 Feb 35.3 °C 34 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
28 Feb 36.2 °C 30 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
1 Mar 35.7 °C 29 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
2 Mar 35.6 °C 28 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
3 Mar 35.8 °C 25 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
4 Mar 36.3 °C 23 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
5 Mar 36.0 °C 32 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
6 Mar 36.0 °C 36 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
7 Mar 36.8 °C 26 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
8 Mar 37.1 °C 26 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
9 Mar 36.1 °C 27 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
10 Mar 37.0 °C 31 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
11 Mar 37.8 °C 32 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
12 Mar 35.6 °C 41 % 28 km/h 0.1 mm High 29
13 Mar 37.0 °C 42 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
14 Mar 38.2 °C 37 % 28 km/h 8.9 mm Low 8
15 Mar after 36.6 °C 44 % 26 km/h 7.9 mm Very low 4

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 29 Jan 2017
After · 21 Mar 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 · 2,695Every 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 Sesan fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 5 February 2017 and 14 March 2017: 38 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 17,221 hectares (172.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Sesan (17,323 ha, 6.4 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 38.2 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 46 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 36, 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

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.