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Sopishte fire, October 2019 Општина Сопиште · Studenichani, Sopishte

Out · last detection 29 Oct 2019, 10:26 UTC

The fire started on 27 October 2019 in Sopishte, North Macedonia, and satellites saw it burning for 3 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 109 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 28th largest in Skopje since 2016 (of 31 with a page). Number 72 in North Macedonia in 2019, of 77.

The power measured by the satellite is low (12.6 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.

Burnt area
109ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
3days
27 Oct 2019 – 29 Oct 2019
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
27 Oct
2019
Heat detections
6
in a single hotspot: 13 MW
Danger at start
18
Moderate · FWI index
Energy released
34MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

29 Oct 2019
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 27 Oct29 Oct

How it evolved, day by day

272829

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

The weather it burned in

18°high
19km/h · peak gust
12%lowest humidity

It had gone 22 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.7 mm on 3 Nov.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Studenichani Општина Студеничани 21,970 inhabitants · 19.5 km from the town
    64 ha reached on 28 Oct
    0.2 %
  2. Sopishte Општина Сопиште 6,713 inhabitants · 15.3 km from the town where it started
    44 ha reached on 27 Oct
    0.2 %

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 land76 %
  • Broadleaved forest24 %

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)
27 Oct 17.6 °C 15 % 17 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
28 Oct 17.6 °C 12 % 18 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
29 Oct 16.6 °C 15 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
30 Oct after 12.1 °C 42 % 16 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
31 Oct after 4.0 °C 79 % 22 km/h 0.2 mm Low 8
1 Nov after 5.0 °C 71 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm Low 6
2 Nov after 8.9 °C 65 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Low 8
3 Nov after 11.4 °C 64 % 52 km/h 1.7 mm Very low 4

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 20 Oct 2019
After · 5 Nov 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.

The smoke

CAMS · Copernicus

On 30 October 2019 the air beside the fire reached 70 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 48: 3.2 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak70 µg/m³
Days over the guideline7 days
PM1085 µg/m³
252627282930311
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 · 6Every 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 Sopishte fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 27 October 2019 and 29 October 2019: 3 days between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 109 hectares (1.1 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Studenichani (64 ha, 0.2 %); Sopishte (44 ha, 0.2 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 15.3 km of Sopishte. 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 17.6 °C, humidity dropped to 12 % and gusts hit 19 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 20, class Moderate.
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.