Silopi fire, 13 June 2019 Silopi
The fire started on 13 June 2019 in Silopi, Türkiye, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 258 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 94th largest in Şırnak since 2016 (of 192 with a page). Number 50 in Türkiye in 2019, of 138.
Compare with…
Suggestions: Silopi · 2016Silopi · 2017Silopi · 2018Zakho · 2016
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
- 258ha
- Copernicus perimeter
- Duration
- 1day
- 13 Jun 2019 – 13 Jun 2019
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- districts
- Started on
- 13 Jun
- 2019
- Danger at start
- 45
- Very high · FWI index
Where it burned
The weather it burned in
It had gone 25 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
59% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 153 ha in 2016, 88 ha in 2017, 2 ha in 2018. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 153 ha that had burned before.
- 153 ha Silopi fire, August 2016 870 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 88 ha Silopi fire, August 2017 286 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2 ha Silopi fire, June 2018 118 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
259 ha0.3 %
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
- Other natural land95 %
- Scrub and transitional woodland4.6 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 13 Jun | 31.5 °C | 21 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 14 Jun after | 32.4 °C | 18 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 15 Jun after | 33.5 °C | 19 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 16 Jun after | 35.1 °C | 15 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 17 Jun after | 33.3 °C | 20 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 18 Jun after | 32.1 °C | 22 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 19 Jun after | 30.5 °C | 25 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 38 |
| 20 Jun after | 31.8 °C | 26 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 38 |
| 21 Jun after | 31.1 °C | 24 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 38 |
| 22 Jun after | 34.1 °C | 22 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 23 Jun after | 35.0 °C | 20 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
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 11 June 2019 the air beside the fire reached 30 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 22: 1.5 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 Silopi fire last?
- Copernicus dates it between 13 June 2019 and 13 June 2019: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 258 hectares (2.6 km²). Official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Silopi (259 ha, 0.3 %).
- Did the fire reach a town?
- The fire started in Silopi and came within 18.5 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 31.5 °C, humidity dropped to 21 % and gusts hit 40 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 45, 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 from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 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.