How long did the Zbarbar fire last?

Copernicus dates it between 13 August 2021 and 15 August 2021: 3 days between the first and last image with fire.

How much area did it burn?

The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 844 hectares (8.4 km²). Official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 2 municipalities: Zbarbar (801 ha, 14 %); Maala (46 ha, 0.8 %).

Did the fire reach a town?

The closest fire to a town centre came within 4.3 km of Zbarbar. 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 40.3 °C, humidity dropped to 8 % and gusts hit 49 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 68, class Extreme.

Where does this data come from?

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

DZ · Algeria · 2021-08-13 → 2021-08-15

Zbarbar fire, August 2021 معالة · Zbarbar, Maala

Out · last detection 15 Aug 2021, 00:45 UTC

The fire started on 13 August 2021 in Zbarbar, Algeria, and satellites saw it burning for 3 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 844 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 9th largest in Blida since 2016 (of 38 with a page). Number 25 in Algeria in 2021, of 92.

Burnt area: 844ha; Copernicus perimeter
Duration: 3days; 13 Aug 2021 – 15 Aug 2021
Municipalities hit: 2; communes
Started on: 13 Aug; 2021
Heat detections: 59; in a single hotspot: 65 MW
Danger at start: 65; Extreme · FWI index
Energy released: 800MW; sum of detected power

Play back 15 Aug 2021

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 13 Aug15 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

131415

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

The weather it burned in

40°high

49km/h · peak gust

8%lowest humidity

It had gone 30 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

Zbarbar معالة 5,296 inhabitants · 4.3 km from the town where it started

801 ha reached on 13 Aug

14 %
Maala

46 ha reached on 13 Aug

0.8 %

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

Mixed forest62 %
Other natural land37 %
Agricultural areas0.7 %

Land cover inside the perimeter as reported by Copernicus EFFIS (outside the Corine Land Cover area).

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)
13 Aug	40.3 °C	8 %	44 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 65
14 Aug	40.2 °C	8 %	49 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 68
15 Aug	39.1 °C	10 %	47 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 64
16 Aug after	38.1 °C	12 %	42 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 60
17 Aug after	33.0 °C	39 %	49 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
18 Aug after	31.4 °C	33 %	45 km/h	0.1 mm	High 38
19 Aug after	35.3 °C	23 %	46 km/h	0.1 mm	Very high 40
20 Aug after	33.9 °C	33 %	47 km/h	0.2 mm	High 36
21 Aug after	36.7 °C	19 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
22 Aug after	37.8 °C	13 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 50
23 Aug after	38.2 °C	12 %	48 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 54
24 Aug after	37.3 °C	15 %	48 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 55
25 Aug after	35.4 °C	20 %	49 km/h	0.3 mm	Very high 49

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 6 Aug 2021

After · 22 Aug 2021

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 13 August 2021 the air beside the fire reached 82 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 39: 2.6 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak82 µg/m³

Days over the guideline7 days

PM10120 µg/m³

WHO 15

1112131415161718

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 · 59Every 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 Algeria ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Zbarbar fire last?: Copernicus dates it between 13 August 2021 and 15 August 2021: 3 days between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?: The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 844 hectares (8.4 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 2 municipalities: Zbarbar (801 ha, 14 %); Maala (46 ha, 0.8 %).
Did the fire reach a town?: The closest fire to a town centre came within 4.3 km of Zbarbar. 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 40.3 °C, humidity dropped to 8 % and gusts hit 49 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 68, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?: From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Algeria (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: 14 · 1021

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.

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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?

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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 14 · 1021.

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 (Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0). 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