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Svilengrad fire, 16 August 2017 Свиленград · Svilengrad

Out · last detection 18 Aug 2017, 01:19 UTC

The fire started on 16 August 2017 in Svilengrad, Bulgaria, and satellites saw it burning for 3 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 540 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 20th largest in Haskovo since 2016 (of 46 with a page). Number 4 in Bulgaria in 2017, of 10.

The power measured by the satellite is low (16.2 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
540ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
3days
16 Aug 2017 – 18 Aug 2017
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
16 Aug
2017
Heat detections
22
in a single hotspot: 16 MW
Danger at start
50
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
166MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

18 Aug 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 16 Aug18 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

161718

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

The weather it burned in

36°high
69km/h · peak gust
18%lowest humidity

It had gone 19 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 3.2 mm on 21 Aug.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Svilengrad Свиленград 19,993 inhabitants · 33.1 km from the town where it started
    540 ha reached on 16 Aug
    0.8 %

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 land84 %
  • Agricultural areas13 %
  • Scrub and transitional woodland3.1 %

Natura 2000 protected area affected: 61 %

Natura 2000 sites (European Environment Agency, 2024 release) crossed by the perimeter.

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)
16 Aug 32.0 °C 36 % 69 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
17 Aug 34.8 °C 22 % 60 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
18 Aug 35.6 °C 18 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
19 Aug after 35.5 °C 24 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
20 Aug after 34.2 °C 32 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
21 Aug after 30.9 °C 43 % 38 km/h 3.2 mm Moderate 12

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 9 Aug 2017
After · 25 Aug 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.

The smoke

CAMS · Copernicus

On 19 August 2017 the air beside the fire reached 27 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 21: 1.4 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak27 µg/m³
Days over the guideline3 days
PM1050 µg/m³
1415161718192021
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 · 22Every 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 Bulgaria ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Svilengrad fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 16 August 2017 and 18 August 2017: 3 days between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 540 hectares (5.4 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Svilengrad (540 ha, 0.8 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 33.1 km of Svilengrad. 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 35.6 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 69 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 53, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Bulgaria (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

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 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 (Public Domain). 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.