How long did the Sumail fire last?

According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 10 September 2026 to 21 September 2026 (12 days). The perimeter dates it from 16 September 2026 to 21 September 2026.

How much area did it burn?

The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 2,240 hectares (22.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire only entered Sumail (2,242 ha, 1.6 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 39.6 °C, humidity dropped to 10 % and gusts hit 54 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 74, class Very extreme.

Where does this data come from?

From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Iraq (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

IQ · Iraq · 2026-09-10 → 2026-09-21

Sumail fire, September 2026 Sumail

Out · last detection 21 Sept 2026, 00:24 UTC

The fire started on 10 September 2026 in Sumail, Iraq, and satellites saw it burning for 12 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,240 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 6th largest in Dohuk since 2016 (of 35 with a page). Number 6 in Iraq in 2026, of 20.

Burnt area: 2,240ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 12days; 10 Sept 2026 – 21 Sept 2026
Municipalities hit: 1; districts
Started on: 10 Sept; 2026
Heat detections: 70; in a single hotspot: 31 MW
Danger at start: 49; Very high · FWI index
Energy released: 817MW; sum of detected power

Play back 21 Sept 2026

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 10 Sept21 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

101112131617182021

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

The weather it burned in

40°high

54km/h · peak gust

10%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 2.2 mm on 1 Oct.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

Sumail where it started

2,242 ha reached on 10 Sept

1.6 %

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)
10 Sept	37.8 °C	11 %	23 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 49
11 Sept	39.1 °C	11 %	25 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 51
12 Sept	39.6 °C	10 %	18 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 48
13 Sept	38.9 °C	13 %	22 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 50
14 Sept	39.4 °C	12 %	23 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 50
15 Sept	38.2 °C	15 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 51
16 Sept	38.2 °C	16 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 52
17 Sept	38.4 °C	14 %	22 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 49
18 Sept	38.2 °C	13 %	54 km/h	0.0 mm	Very extreme 74
19 Sept	34.7 °C	21 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 47
20 Sept	35.1 °C	20 %	21 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
21 Sept	35.2 °C	21 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
22 Sept after	37.7 °C	19 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 52
23 Sept after	39.2 °C	17 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 49
24 Sept after	36.2 °C	20 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 50
25 Sept after	36.6 °C	17 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
26 Sept after	39.1 °C	15 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 49
27 Sept after	39.9 °C	16 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 50
28 Sept after	36.3 °C	21 %	33 km/h	0.2 mm	Extreme 57
29 Sept after	29.6 °C	34 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
30 Sept after	31.0 °C	30 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	High 33
1 Oct after	28.4 °C	40 %	35 km/h	2.2 mm	Moderate 16

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 3 Sept 2026

After · 28 Sept 2026

Before After

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 23 September 2026 the air beside the fire reached 25 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 18: 1.2 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak25 µg/m³

Days over the guideline2 days

PM1066 µg/m³

Optical depth1.55

WHO 15

89101112131415161718192021222324

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 · 70Every 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 time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Iraq ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Sumail fire last?: According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 10 September 2026 to 21 September 2026 (12 days). The perimeter dates it from 16 September 2026 to 21 September 2026.
How much area did it burn?: The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 2,240 hectares (22.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire only entered Sumail (2,242 ha, 1.6 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 39.6 °C, humidity dropped to 10 % and gusts hit 54 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 74, class Very extreme.
Where does this data come from?: From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Iraq (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

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · Copernicus ↗

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 3.0 Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY 3.0 IGO)). 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.

Where it burned