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Zhelino fire, March 2019 Општина Желино · Zhelino

Out · last detection 31 Mar 2019, 00:17 UTC

The fire started on 27 March 2019 in Zhelino, North Macedonia, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 124 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 38th largest in Polog since 2016 (of 49 with a page). Number 64 in North Macedonia in 2019, of 77.

The power measured by the satellite is low (19.8 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: Makedonski Brod · 2017Saraj · 2017Saraj · 2026Makedonski Brod · 2024

Burnt area
124ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
5days
27 Mar 2019 – 31 Mar 2019
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
27 Mar
2019
Heat detections
23
in a single hotspot: 20 MW
Danger at start
10
Low · FWI index
Average daily power
27MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 27 Mar31 Mar
31 Mar 2019

How it evolved, day by day

27 Mar 2019 · 6 MW · 1 28 Mar 2019 · 28 MW · 2 29 Mar 2019 · 88 MW · 12 30 Mar 2019 · 13 MW · 7 31 Mar 2019 · 1 MW · 1
27 Mar 28 Mar 29 Mar 30 Mar 31 Mar

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

The weather it burned in

12°high
48km/h · peak gust
17%lowest humidity

It had gone 12 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. Zhelino Општина Желино 13,645 inhabitants · 17.1 km from the centre where it started
    124 ha reached on 27 Mar
    0.6 %

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

  • Scrub and transitional woodland85 %
  • Broadleaved forest10 %
  • Agricultural areas4.8 %

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)
27 Mar 9.7 °C 25 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Low 10
28 Mar 11.6 °C 17 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 13
29 Mar 12.0 °C 15 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 14
30 Mar 14.1 °C 19 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 14
31 Mar 17.6 °C 10 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
1 Apr after 18.9 °C 10 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
2 Apr after 17.6 °C 17 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
3 Apr after 13.8 °C 33 % 33 km/h 0.2 mm Moderate 14
4 Apr after 14.4 °C 29 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 15
5 Apr after 9.5 °C 58 % 38 km/h 0.5 mm Low 10
6 Apr after 14.9 °C 28 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 12
7 Apr after 15.4 °C 29 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 11

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 20 Mar 2019
After · 7 Apr 2019

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 31 March 2019 the air beside the fire reached 35 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 22: 1.5 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak35 µg/m³
Days over the guideline7 days
PM1044 µg/m³
25262728293031
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 · 23Every 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 North Macedonia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Zhelino fire last?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 27 March 2019 to 31 March 2019 (5 days). The perimeter dates it from 27 March 2019 to 28 March 2019.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 124 hectares (1.2 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Zhelino (124 ha, 0.6 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The fire started in Zhelino and came within 17.1 km of its centre. That is the distance from the perimeter, or the nearest hotspot, to the point marking the centre; it does not mean it entered the houses.
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 11.6 °C, humidity dropped to 17 % and gusts hit 48 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 13, class Moderate.
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 · 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

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 193 · 112.

How we know this
  • Perimeter: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
  • Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 27 March 2019 to 28 March 2019. 23 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.

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.