Taunggyi fire, January 2023 Taunggyi, Hopong, Lawksawk
The fire started on 14 January 2023 in Taunggyi, Myanmar, and satellites saw it burning for 37 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 13,906 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.
It is the 33th largest in Shan since 2016 (of 806 with a page). Number 10 in Myanmar in 2023, of 240.
Compare with…
- Burnt area
- 13,906ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 37days
- 14 Jan 2023 – 19 Feb 2023
- Municipalities hit
- 3
- municipalities
- Started on
- 14 Jan
- 2023
- Heat detections
- 801
- in a single hotspot: 95 MW
- Danger at start
- 21
- Moderate · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 232MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone 24 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 2.3 mm on 26 Feb.
This area had burned before
86% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 3,101 ha in 2016, 7,176 ha in 2017, 3,029 ha in 2019, 6,841 ha in 2020, 5,850 ha in 2021, 3,000 ha in 2022. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 11,967 ha that had burned before.
- 4,633 ha Taunggyi fire, February 2020 11,481 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,331 ha Taunggyi fire, January 2021 7,126 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,221 ha Taunggyi fire, February 2017 3,734 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,917 ha Taunggyi fire, January 2021 2,672 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,762 ha Taunggyi fire, February 2016 2,307 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,681 ha Lawksawk fire, March 2017 3,537 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,390 ha Hopong fire, February 2020 4,849 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,208 ha Lawksawk fire, February 2022 4,952 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
Berlin boundary: geoBoundaries · Federal Agency for Cartography and Geodesy (dl-de/by-2-0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
Taunggyi where it started6,135 ha reached on 15 Jan3.0 %
-
4,750 ha reached on 14 Jan1.6 %
-
3,097 ha reached on 18 Jan0.6 %
Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS 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.
People and buildings inside the perimeter
GHSL 2025Inside the perimeter there were about 4.7 hectares of built-up land and about 2,200 residents (GHSL 2025, satellite-based estimate).
This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned. The GHSL 2025 epoch is a projection made from 2020 and earlier data.
Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 14 Jan | 27.0 °C | 30 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 15 Jan | 25.1 °C | 35 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 16 Jan | 26.5 °C | 35 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 17 Jan | 26.5 °C | 35 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 18 Jan | 26.9 °C | 28 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 19 Jan | 26.9 °C | 32 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 20 Jan | 28.0 °C | 28 % | 20 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 21 Jan | 28.5 °C | 30 % | 20 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 22 Jan | 28.5 °C | 26 % | 21 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 23 |
| 23 Jan | 28.3 °C | 26 % | 21 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 24 Jan | 29.6 °C | 29 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 25 Jan | 28.2 °C | 38 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 26 Jan | 28.5 °C | 31 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 27 Jan | 29.8 °C | 29 % | 20 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 28 Jan | 29.2 °C | 37 % | 21 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 29 Jan | 28.0 °C | 45 % | 19 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 30 Jan | 27.9 °C | 43 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 31 Jan | 29.5 °C | 35 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 1 Feb | 30.1 °C | 35 % | 20 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 2 Feb | 29.8 °C | 41 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 3 Feb | 28.7 °C | 40 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 23 |
| 4 Feb | 30.5 °C | 37 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 5 Feb | 31.0 °C | 18 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 6 Feb | 29.5 °C | 21 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 7 Feb | 28.3 °C | 20 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 8 Feb | 27.5 °C | 24 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 9 Feb | 28.6 °C | 27 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 10 Feb | 28.7 °C | 28 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 11 Feb | 30.0 °C | 25 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 12 Feb | 30.2 °C | 27 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 13 Feb | 30.4 °C | 24 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 14 Feb | 30.5 °C | 25 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 15 Feb | 31.5 °C | 19 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 16 Feb | 30.4 °C | 29 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 17 Feb | 23.9 °C | 54 % | 23 km/h | 2.2 mm | Low 6 |
| 18 Feb | 29.3 °C | 29 % | 21 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 18 |
| 19 Feb | 30.1 °C | 28 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 20 Feb after | 30.0 °C | 31 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 21 Feb after | 29.9 °C | 31 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 22 Feb after | 30.6 °C | 31 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 23 Feb after | 30.1 °C | 26 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 24 Feb after | 30.8 °C | 24 % | 21 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 25 Feb after | 31.1 °C | 27 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 26 Feb after | 26.4 °C | 53 % | 30 km/h | 2.3 mm | Low 7 |
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 25 January 2023 the air beside the fire reached 78 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 42: 2.8 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)
Detections table · 801Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 12,822 haHopong6 March 2025 · 10 days · 8 km away
- 11,481 haTaunggyiFebruary 2020 · 25 days · 8 km away
- 7,126 haTaunggyi10 January 2021 · 26 days · 13 km away
- 8,195 haTaunggyi19 February 2026 · 19 days · 21 km away
- 36,894 haLawksawk19 February 2024 · 35 days · 23 km away
- 24,421 haLawksawk27 February 2026 · 14 days · 24 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Taunggyi fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 14 January 2023 to 19 February 2023 (37 days). The perimeter dates it from 17 January 2023 to 12 February 2023.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 13,906 hectares (139.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 3 municipalities: Taunggyi (6,135 ha, 3.0 %); Hopong (4,750 ha, 1.6 %); Lawksawk (3,097 ha, 0.6 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 31.5 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 45 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 40, class Very high.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Myanmar (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
History of this page · 2 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
- Last day with fire: 12 February 2023 → 19 February 2023.
- Start date: 17 January 2023 → 14 January 2023.
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: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery; 3 polygons grouped in this page.
- Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 17 January 2023 to 12 February 2023. 801 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.
- Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2025, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.
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 ADM3 (Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 (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.