Trebinje fire, August 2026 Trebinje
The fire started on 20 August 2026 in Trebinje, Bosnia & Herzegovina, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 6,073 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.
It is the largest fire in Republika Srpska since 2016 (of 391 with a page). Number 3 in Bosnia & Herzegovina in 2026, of 94.
- Burnt area
- 6,073ha
- Copernicus perimeter
- Duration
- 1day
- 20 Aug 2026 – 20 Aug 2026
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- municipalities
- Started on
- 20 Aug
- 2026
- Heat detections
- 473
- in a single hotspot: 61 MW
- Danger at start
- 24
- High · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 459MW
- 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 23 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 3.2 mm on 11 Sept.
This area had burned before
61% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 195 ha in 2016, 1,546 ha in 2017, 1,959 ha in 2021, 1 ha in 2025.
- 1,782 ha Trebinje fire, August 2021 2,067 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,546 ha Trebinje fire, June 2017 1,874 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 195 ha Trebinje fire, July 2016 220 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 177 ha Trebinje fire, June 2021 177 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Trebinje where it started5,966 ha reached on 20 Aug6.8 %
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 land38 %
- Sclerophyllous scrub36 %
- Scrub and transitional woodland12 %
- Broadleaved forest9.2 %
- Agricultural areas2.6 %
- Mixed forest2.0 %
Protected area affected (EFFIS layer): 0 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 20 Aug | 30.5 °C | 34 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 21 Aug after | 30.8 °C | 31 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 22 Aug after | 29.9 °C | 39 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 23 Aug after | 29.8 °C | 38 % | 32 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 27 |
| 24 Aug after | 29.6 °C | 31 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 25 Aug after | 28.2 °C | 39 % | 40 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 28 |
| 26 Aug after | 30.2 °C | 34 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 27 Aug after | 30.8 °C | 40 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 28 Aug after | 33.2 °C | 34 % | 39 km/h | 1.0 mm | High 23 |
| 29 Aug after | 32.7 °C | 34 % | 34 km/h | 2.0 mm | Moderate 16 |
| 30 Aug after | 30.6 °C | 40 % | 31 km/h | 0.5 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 31 Aug after | 29.9 °C | 47 % | 26 km/h | 0.2 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 1 Sept after | 29.8 °C | 41 % | 24 km/h | 0.2 mm | High 22 |
| 2 Sept after | 28.9 °C | 39 % | 30 km/h | 0.6 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 3 Sept after | 28.9 °C | 30 % | 23 km/h | 0.7 mm | High 22 |
| 4 Sept after | 28.4 °C | 30 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 5 Sept after | 30.2 °C | 32 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 6 Sept after | 29.3 °C | 31 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 7 Sept after | 29.6 °C | 20 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 8 Sept after | 28.9 °C | 33 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 9 Sept after | 28.0 °C | 39 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 10 Sept after | 28.5 °C | 41 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 11 Sept after | 24.9 °C | 57 % | 48 km/h | 3.2 mm | Low 6 |
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 August 2026 the air beside the fire reached 93 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 38: 2.6 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 · 473Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 3,061 haTrebinje8 August 2021 · 6 days · 20 km away
- 5,832 haTrebinje9 July 2025 · 5 days · 26 km away
- 4,594 haBileća15 March 2022 · 1 day · 31 km away
- 4,394 haCetinje Municipality10 August 2021 · 6 days · 35 km away
- 7,850 haCetinje Municipality8 August 2021 · 14 days · 37 km away
- 3,663 haBileća11 August 2025 · 6 days · 37 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Trebinje fire last?
- Copernicus dates it between 20 August 2026 and 20 August 2026: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 6,073 hectares (60.7 km²). Official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Trebinje (5,966 ha, 6.8 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 33.2 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 40 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 33, 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.