Xayabury fire, March 2024 Xayabury
The fire started on 27 March 2024 in Xayabury, Laos, and satellites saw it burning for 17 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,075 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 57th largest in Xaignabouli since 2016 (of 122 with a page). Number 42 in Laos in 2024, of 109.
- Burnt area
- 3,075ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 17days
- 27 Mar 2024 – 12 Apr 2024
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- districts
- Started on
- 27 Mar
- 2024
- Heat detections
- 122
- in a single hotspot: 109 MW
- Danger at start
- 10
- Low · FWI index
- Energy released
- 1.6GW
- 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 6 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.4 mm on 16 Apr.
This area had burned before
93% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,595 ha in 2017, 830 ha in 2018, 769 ha in 2019, 1,763 ha in 2020, 1,140 ha in 2022, 942 ha in 2023. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,858 ha that had burned before.
- 1,595 ha Xayabury fire, April 2017 2,639 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,254 ha Xayabury fire, March 2020 3,900 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,140 ha Xayabury fire, April 2022 2,401 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1 ha Xayabury fire, March 2020 5,117 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Xayabury where it started3,089 ha reached on 27 Mar1.4 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 27 Mar | 30.1 °C | 56 % | 35 km/h | 0.9 mm | Low 10 |
| 28 Mar | 33.0 °C | 38 % | 26 km/h | 0.5 mm | Moderate 16 |
| 29 Mar | 33.1 °C | 41 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 20 |
| 30 Mar | 33.9 °C | 34 % | 45 km/h | 0.3 mm | High 23 |
| 31 Mar | 35.5 °C | 32 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 1 Apr | 36.5 °C | 24 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 2 Apr | 36.8 °C | 24 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 3 Apr | 37.0 °C | 28 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 4 Apr | 36.6 °C | 33 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 5 Apr | 37.1 °C | 33 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 6 Apr | 36.7 °C | 40 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 7 Apr | 36.8 °C | 37 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 8 Apr | 36.9 °C | 39 % | 30 km/h | 0.5 mm | High 27 |
| 9 Apr | 34.9 °C | 47 % | 37 km/h | 2.4 mm | Low 10 |
| 10 Apr | 30.0 °C | 55 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 14 |
| 11 Apr | 34.4 °C | 42 % | 24 km/h | 1.5 mm | Moderate 11 |
| 12 Apr | 34.1 °C | 46 % | 31 km/h | 0.1 mm | Moderate 18 |
| 13 Apr after | 36.1 °C | 39 % | 27 km/h | 0.6 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 14 Apr after | 35.2 °C | 42 % | 31 km/h | 0.2 mm | High 23 |
| 15 Apr after | 33.1 °C | 49 % | 30 km/h | 0.7 mm | Moderate 17 |
| 16 Apr after | 32.8 °C | 47 % | 32 km/h | 1.4 mm | Moderate 12 |
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 7 April 2024 the air beside the fire reached 116 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 65: 4.4 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 · 122Every 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 Xayabury fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 27 March 2024 to 12 April 2024 (17 days). The perimeter dates it from 1 April 2024 to 6 April 2024.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 3,075 hectares (30.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Xayabury (3,089 ha, 1.4 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 37.1 °C, humidity dropped to 24 % and gusts hit 45 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 30, class High.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Laos (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.
Report an error
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 ADM2 (Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY 3.0 IGO)). 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.