How long did the Veles fire last?

Copernicus dates it between 26 August 2019 and 26 August 2019: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.

How much area did it burn?

The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 304 hectares (3.0 km²). Official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire only entered Veles (304 ha, 0.7 %).

Did the fire reach a town?

The closest fire to a town centre came within 1.7 km of Veles. That is the distance to the perimeter or nearest hotspot; it does not mean it entered the houses.

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 36.4 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 29 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 42, class Very high.

Where does this data come from?

From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of North Macedonia (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

MK · North Macedonia · 2019-08-26 → 2019-08-26

Veles fire, 26 August 2019 Општина Велес · Veles

Out · last detection 26 Aug 2019, 12:06 UTC

The fire started on 26 August 2019 in Veles, North Macedonia, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 304 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 24th largest in Vardar since 2016 (of 49 with a page). Number 23 in North Macedonia in 2019, of 77.

Burnt area: 304ha; Copernicus perimeter
Duration: 1day; 26 Aug 2019 – 26 Aug 2019
Municipalities hit: 1; municipalities
Started on: 26 Aug; 2019
Heat detections: 8; in a single hotspot: 265 MW
Danger at start: 42; Very high · FWI index
Energy released: 898MW; sum of detected power

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 26 Aug26 Aug

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

36°high

29km/h · peak gust

20%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

Veles Општина Велес 48,463 inhabitants · 1.7 km from the town where it started

304 ha reached on 26 Aug

0.7 %

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

Agricultural areas54 %
Scrub and transitional woodland46 %

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)
26 Aug	36.4 °C	20 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
27 Aug after	35.2 °C	27 %	22 km/h	0.1 mm	High 36
28 Aug after	35.5 °C	22 %	22 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
29 Aug after	35.7 °C	19 %	23 km/h	0.0 mm	High 38
30 Aug after	35.1 °C	19 %	25 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
31 Aug after	34.7 °C	22 %	33 km/h	0.1 mm	Very high 44
1 Sept after	34.4 °C	16 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38
2 Sept after	35.1 °C	12 %	21 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
3 Sept after	33.9 °C	21 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 49
4 Sept after	30.0 °C	34 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
5 Sept after	32.5 °C	19 %	21 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 19 Aug 2019

After · 2 Sept 2019

Before After

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 26 August 2019 the air beside the fire reached 25 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 18: 1.2 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak25 µg/m³

Days over the guideline2 days

PM1031 µg/m³

WHO 15

242526272829

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 · 8Every 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 time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

All fires in North Macedonia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Veles fire last?: Copernicus dates it between 26 August 2019 and 26 August 2019: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?: The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 304 hectares (3.0 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire only entered Veles (304 ha, 0.7 %).
Did the fire reach a town?: The closest fire to a town centre came within 1.7 km of Veles. That is the distance to the perimeter or nearest hotspot; it does not mean it entered the houses.
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 36.4 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 29 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 42, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?: From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of North Macedonia (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: 193 · 112

Центар за управување со кризи ↗

Satellite cross-check

NASA FIRMS ↗
EFFIS · Copernicus ↗

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?

Dates or duration Place or towns Burned area Name It was not a wildfire Same fire as another page Something else

What really happened?

Your connection to the fire (optional) Email (optional)

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 193 · 112.

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.

Where it burned