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Zhigansky Ulus fire, 9 July 2020 Zhigansky Ulus

Out · last detection 16 Jul 2020, 17:37 UTC

The fire started on 9 July 2020 in Zhigansky Ulus, Russia, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,329 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 1307th largest in Sakha Republic since 2016 (of 1422 with a page). Number 534 in Russia in 2020, of 594.

Burnt area
3,329ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
8days
9 Jul 2020 – 16 Jul 2020
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
9 Jul
2020
Heat detections
307
in a single hotspot: 328 MW
Danger at start
35
High · FWI index
Energy released
6.1GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

16 Jul 2020
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 9 Jul16 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

91011141516

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

The weather it burned in

30°high
57km/h · peak gust
24%lowest humidity

It had gone 9 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 6.1 mm on 18 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
    3,141 ha reached on 9 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)
2 Jul 25.9 °C 31 % 57 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
3 Jul 17.5 °C 54 % 56 km/h 0.6 mm High 23
4 Jul 17.4 °C 47 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
5 Jul 17.8 °C 35 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
6 Jul 13.3 °C 52 % 22 km/h 0.6 mm Moderate 13
7 Jul 17.1 °C 58 % 21 km/h 0.6 mm Low 11
8 Jul 21.7 °C 36 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
9 Jul 24.8 °C 31 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
10 Jul 26.5 °C 33 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
11 Jul 26.0 °C 49 % 43 km/h 0.2 mm High 25
12 Jul 29.9 °C 24 % 38 km/h 1.3 mm High 25
13 Jul 25.8 °C 41 % 27 km/h 0.3 mm High 23
14 Jul 28.7 °C 28 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
15 Jul 28.5 °C 34 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
16 Jul 27.9 °C 36 % 22 km/h 2.4 mm Low 10
17 Jul after 21.8 °C 47 % 28 km/h 0.4 mm Moderate 14
18 Jul after 19.9 °C 64 % 22 km/h 6.1 mm Very low 1

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 2 Jul 2020
After · 23 Jul 2020

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 · 307Every 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 9 July 2020 and 16 July 2020: 8 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 3,329 hectares (33.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Zhigansky Ulus (3,141 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 29.9 °C, humidity dropped to 24 % and gusts hit 57 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 35, 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
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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 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.