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Thabeikkyin fire, 17 February 2026 Thabeikkyin

Out · last detection 14 Mar 2026, 06:13 UTC

The fire started on 17 February 2026 in Thabeikkyin, Myanmar (Burma), and satellites saw it burning for 25 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 10,021 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 4th largest in Mandalay since 2016 (of 72 with a page). Number 44 in Myanmar (Burma) in 2026, of 418.

Burnt area
10,021ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
25days
17 Feb 2026 – 13 Mar 2026
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
17 Feb
2026
Heat detections
318
in a single hotspot: 96 MW
Danger at start
25
High · FWI index
Energy released
1.8GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

14 Mar 2026
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 17 Feb13 Mar

How it evolved, day by day

17181920212223242526272812567891314

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

The weather it burned in

38°high
52km/h · peak gust
18%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 2.9 mm on 22 Mar.

This area had burned before

20% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 369 ha in 2017, 1,662 ha in 2024.

What happened to each town

  1. Thabeikkyin where it started
    10,044 ha reached on 12 Feb
    3.9 %

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)
12 Feb 33.6 °C 26 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
13 Feb 33.4 °C 27 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
14 Feb 33.2 °C 23 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
15 Feb 33.6 °C 25 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
16 Feb 34.0 °C 27 % 18 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
17 Feb 34.0 °C 25 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
18 Feb 35.0 °C 18 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
19 Feb 35.1 °C 24 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
20 Feb 35.4 °C 30 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
21 Feb 35.8 °C 25 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
22 Feb 35.0 °C 25 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
23 Feb 33.7 °C 26 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
24 Feb 33.8 °C 23 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
25 Feb 31.9 °C 39 % 32 km/h 0.2 mm High 29
26 Feb 30.8 °C 45 % 19 km/h 0.3 mm High 25
27 Feb 31.9 °C 35 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
28 Feb 33.2 °C 30 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
1 Mar 33.2 °C 25 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
2 Mar 34.2 °C 24 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
3 Mar 32.2 °C 32 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
4 Mar 34.1 °C 28 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
5 Mar 35.5 °C 28 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
6 Mar 35.4 °C 30 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
7 Mar 35.8 °C 33 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
8 Mar 36.3 °C 23 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
9 Mar 37.5 °C 18 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
10 Mar 36.7 °C 22 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
11 Mar 36.3 °C 31 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
12 Mar 34.5 °C 34 % 31 km/h 0.1 mm High 35
13 Mar 33.0 °C 33 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
14 Mar after 34.9 °C 30 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
15 Mar after 34.6 °C 29 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
16 Mar after 33.4 °C 33 % 45 km/h 0.1 mm High 37
17 Mar after 32.5 °C 30 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
18 Mar after 35.8 °C 24 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
19 Mar after 36.1 °C 24 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
20 Mar after 36.2 °C 27 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
21 Mar after 33.4 °C 34 % 24 km/h 0.7 mm High 30
22 Mar after 30.4 °C 46 % 32 km/h 2.9 mm Low 8

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 10 Feb 2026
After · 20 Mar 2026

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 4 March 2026 the air beside the fire reached 88 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 67: 4.5 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak88 µg/m³
Days over the guideline30 days
PM1095 µg/m³
Optical depth1.57
151617181920212223242526272812345678910111213141516
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 · 318Every 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 Myanmar (Burma) ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Thabeikkyin fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 17 February 2026 and 13 March 2026: 25 days between the first and last heat detection of the perimeter.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 10,021 hectares (100.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Thabeikkyin (10,044 ha, 3.9 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 37.5 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 52 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 44, 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 (Burma) (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

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 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.