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RO · Romania · –

Vânători fire, August 2026 Vânători, Cujmir

Out · last detection 27 Aug 2026, 01:32 UTC

The fire started on 21 August 2026 in Vânători, Romania, and satellites saw it burning for 13 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 148 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 56th largest in Mehedinți since 2016 (of 87 with a page). Number 41 in Romania in 2026, of 59.

The power measured by the satellite is low (6.6 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Dumbrava · 2025Kladovo Municipality · 2024Jiana · 2021Devesel · 2021

Burnt area
148ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
≈ 13days
21 Aug 2026 – 2 Sept 2026
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
21 Aug
2026
Heat detections
17
in a single hotspot: 7 MW
Danger at start
39
Very high · FWI index
Average daily power
11MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 21 Aug2 Sept
27 Aug 2026

How it evolved, day by day

21 Aug 2026 · 6 MW · 3 22 Aug 2026 · 33 MW · 9 26 Aug 2026 · 1 MW · 2 27 Aug 2026 · 3 MW · 3
21 Aug 22 Aug 26 Aug 27 Aug

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

The weather it burned in

41°high
38km/h · peak gust
10%lowest humidity

It had gone 11 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Vânători where it started
    148 ha reached on 21 Aug
    2.9 %
  2. Cujmir
    0 ha reached on 22 Aug
    0.0 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the official 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.

What burned

  • Agricultural areas99 %
  • Broadleaved forest1.4 %

Land cover inside the perimeter according to Corine Land Cover, as reported by Copernicus.

People and buildings inside the perimeter

GHSL 2025
Built-up area< 0.1 ha
Residents< 20

Inside the perimeter there was no noticeable built-up land and almost nobody lived there (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)

Started with Very dry air: 8.7 % of the area in Romania

Day High Min. humidity Peak gust Rain Danger (FWI)
21 Aug 41.0 °C 14 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
22 Aug 39.1 °C 19 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
23 Aug 35.3 °C 19 % 31 km/h 0.2 mm Very high 48
24 Aug 35.4 °C 20 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
25 Aug 36.2 °C 28 % 33 km/h 0.3 mm Very high 48
26 Aug 32.6 °C 38 % 37 km/h 0.3 mm High 25
27 Aug 34.8 °C 23 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
28 Aug 27.1 °C 41 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
29 Aug 32.0 °C 25 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
30 Aug 34.3 °C 27 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
31 Aug 37.0 °C 19 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
1 Sept 34.6 °C 29 % 32 km/h 0.2 mm High 34
2 Sept 35.5 °C 10 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
3 Sept after 33.4 °C 16 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
4 Sept after 33.8 °C 18 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
5 Sept after 38.2 °C 7 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
6 Sept after 31.7 °C 14 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 68
7 Sept after 30.4 °C 15 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
8 Sept after 32.4 °C 9 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
9 Sept after 33.7 °C 14 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
10 Sept after 34.0 °C 18 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
11 Sept after 36.0 °C 20 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
12 Sept after 25.7 °C 29 % 48 km/h 0.3 mm Extreme 50

Its twins: fires that started in the same weather

It started with an FWI of 39.0, a minimum humidity of 14% and 11 days without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2016: 30.

FWI at the start 39.0
Minimum humidity 14 %
Days without rain 11
this fire chosen twins rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar

Outlines of the closest twins

Dumbrava fire, August 2025
234 ha 2 days FWI 38.3 Min. humidity 14 % 41 km away, in 2025

First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 2.0 mm on 31 Aug.

See its page Compare with this fire

What happened to them

2 days
median duration
208 ha
median area
0 %
went past 1,000 ha
2.3 mm
rain at the end (median; 27 of 30 had it)

It burned an area similar to its twins (148 ha against a median of 208 ha) and lasted 13 days, against 2 days.

In 3 of 30, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 2.3 mm.

This is a bank of analogues: it shows what usually happens, not what will happen. With fewer than 15 twins we give no figures. How we calculate it

How it ended

—first rain
—no rain in ten days
38km/h · max. gust

It was considered over on 2 Sept, and not even 1 mm fell in the following ten days: it went out without rain. Twins with rain when they ended: 27 of 30, with a median of 2.3 mm.

Weather on this page: Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)

How a twin is chosen

  • Same area: fires that have already ended, less than 250 km from this one, since 2016.
  • Same start: we compare the FWI on the first day, the minimum humidity that day and the run of days without rain before it. The slider sets how much they may differ.
  • Only pages with final weather data (ERA5 reanalysis) calculated in the same way as this fire’s; agricultural and grass burns and pages with data under review are left out.
  • Fires burning at the same time as this one (a week before or after) are left out: they share the same spell of weather and do not count as a precedent.
  • They are sorted by similarity, and the outlines of the first five are drawn.

How we calculate it

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 14 Aug 2026
After · 9 Sept 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 22 August 2026 the air beside the fire reached 26 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak26 µg/m³
Days over the guideline0 days
PM1032 µg/m³
Optical depth0.43
20 Aug22 Aug24 Aug
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 · 17Every 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 Romania

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Vânători fire last?
The official perimeter only gives the start date (22 August 2026). The end comes from the heat detections inside the perimeter: it burned until 2 September 2026 (13 days from 21 August 2026), the last day with detections before more than 10 days in a row without any, so it is approximate.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 148 hectares (1.5 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Vânători (148 ha, 2.9 %); Cujmir (0 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 41.0 °C, humidity dropped to 10 % and gusts hit 38 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 48, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Romania (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.
How did the fires that started in similar weather in this area end?
Fires less than 250 km away that started since 2016 with a similar FWI, humidity and dry spell: 30. Their median duration was 2 days and their median area 208 ha; 0 % went past 1,000 ha. In 3 of 30, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 2.3 mm.

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 · Emergency number and official warnings

Satellite cross-check

History of this page Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.

No changes since 24 October 2026.

RSS Changes to this page With cross-checks and a citable version

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.

How we know this
  • Perimeter: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
  • The official perimeter has no end date: the end is the last day with VIIRS detections inside the perimeter before a gap of more than 10 days (150 days at most), so it is approximate. 17 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.

How we build fire pages: methodology

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 (Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)). 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.