Skip to content
worldfires
RU · Russia · →

Zhigansky Ulus fire, July 2016 Zhigansky Ulus

Out · last detection 29 Jul 2016, 04:43 UTC

The fire started on 16 July 2016 in Zhigansky Ulus, Russia, and satellites saw it burning for 14 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 6,982 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 719th largest in Sakha Republic since 2016 (of 1422 with a page). Number 294 in Russia in 2016, of 694.

Burnt area
6,982ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
14days
16 Jul 2016 – 29 Jul 2016
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
16 Jul
2016
Heat detections
619
in a single hotspot: 257 MW
Danger at start
18
Moderate · FWI index
Energy released
6.4GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

29 Jul 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 16 Jul29 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

1617181920212223242526272829

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

The weather it burned in

28°high
48km/h · peak gust
25%lowest humidity

It had gone 5 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 13.8 mm on 30 Jul.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Zhigansky Ulus where it started
    6,423 ha reached on 16 Jul
    0.0 %

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)
9 Jul 28.5 °C 32 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
10 Jul 18.2 °C 39 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
11 Jul 10.1 °C 41 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
12 Jul 9.3 °C 48 % 46 km/h 2.1 mm Very low 4
13 Jul 10.7 °C 45 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Low 6
14 Jul 13.9 °C 52 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Low 6
15 Jul 17.6 °C 35 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Low 10
16 Jul 20.5 °C 36 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 14
17 Jul 19.6 °C 45 % 27 km/h 0.4 mm Moderate 14
18 Jul 22.2 °C 45 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 13
19 Jul 25.7 °C 25 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
20 Jul 23.2 °C 46 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
21 Jul 19.3 °C 36 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
22 Jul 16.9 °C 47 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
23 Jul 20.1 °C 48 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
24 Jul 24.9 °C 34 % 16 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
25 Jul 27.3 °C 38 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
26 Jul 26.5 °C 47 % 17 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
27 Jul 27.3 °C 43 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
28 Jul 26.5 °C 49 % 25 km/h 0.4 mm Moderate 19
29 Jul 25.7 °C 48 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
30 Jul after 21.9 °C 54 % 37 km/h 13.8 mm Very low 1

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 9 Jul 2016
After · 5 Aug 2016

If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.

Detections table · 619Every 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 Russia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Zhigansky Ulus fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 16 July 2016 and 29 July 2016: 14 days between the first and last heat detection of the perimeter.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 6,982 hectares (69.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Zhigansky Ulus (6,423 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 28.5 °C, humidity dropped to 25 % and gusts hit 48 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 23, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Russia (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: 112

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
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.

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 (Open Data Commons Open Database License 1.0). 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.