Tomislavgrad fire, 7 August 2021 Tomislavgrad
The fire started on 7 August 2021 in Tomislavgrad, Bosnia & Herzegovina, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 6,043 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 7th largest in Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina since 2016 (of 520 with a page). Number 2 in Bosnia & Herzegovina in 2021, of 86.
- Burnt area
- 6,043ha
- Copernicus perimeter
- Duration
- 5days
- 7 Aug 2021 – 11 Aug 2021
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- municipalities
- Started on
- 7 Aug
- 2021
- Heat detections
- 224
- in a single hotspot: 107 MW
- Danger at start
- 18
- Moderate · FWI index
- Energy released
- 2.9GW
- sum of detected power
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 0 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 12.2 mm on 17 Aug.
This area had burned before
35% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 671 ha in 2016, 1,205 ha in 2017, 278 ha in 2020.
- 1,205 ha Tomislavgrad fire, March 2017 2,087 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 671 ha Tomislavgrad fire, December 2016 974 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 229 ha Tomislavgrad fire, January 2020 229 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 43 ha Tomislavgrad fire, April 2020 148 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 5 ha Tomislavgrad fire, February 2020 764 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Tomislavgrad where it started6,038 ha reached on 7 Aug6.1 %
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 land78 %
- Scrub and transitional woodland15 %
- Agricultural areas4.7 %
- Broadleaved forest2.4 %
- Coniferous forest0.6 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 7 Aug | 29.0 °C | 32 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 18 |
| 8 Aug | 31.7 °C | 28 % | 51 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 9 Aug | 32.9 °C | 23 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 10 Aug | 33.0 °C | 27 % | 38 km/h | 1.0 mm | High 22 |
| 11 Aug | 32.1 °C | 32 % | 36 km/h | 3.4 mm | Low 11 |
| 12 Aug after | 30.5 °C | 27 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 23 |
| 13 Aug after | 32.2 °C | 20 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 14 Aug after | 32.8 °C | 22 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 15 Aug after | 34.4 °C | 17 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 16 Aug after | 32.5 °C | 21 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 17 Aug after | 27.7 °C | 36 % | 44 km/h | 12.2 mm | Very low 3 |
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.
Detections table · 224Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Tomislavgrad fire last?
- Copernicus dates it between 7 August 2021 and 11 August 2021: 5 days between the first and last image with fire.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 6,043 hectares (60.4 km²). Official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Tomislavgrad (6,038 ha, 6.1 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 33.0 °C, humidity dropped to 23 % and gusts hit 51 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 28, class High.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Bosnia & Herzegovina (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: 123 · 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
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 ADM3 (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.