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Aboudéia fire, 18 January 2019 Aboudéia, Bahr-Azoum, Barh-Signaka

Out · last detection 26 Jan 2019, 11:32 UTC

The fire started on 18 January 2019 in Aboudéia, Chad, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 7,428 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.

It is the 26th largest in Salamat since 2016 (of 574 with a page). Number 12 in Chad in 2019, of 154.

Burnt area
7,428ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
8days
18 Jan 2019 – 25 Jan 2019
Municipalities hit
3
departments
Started on
18 Jan
2019
Heat detections
287
in a single hotspot: 57 MW
Danger at start
52
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
3.5GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

26 Jan 2019
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 18 Jan25 Jan

How it evolved, day by day

181920212223242526

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
33km/h · peak gust
10%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

84% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 6,212 ha in 2017, 2,534 ha in 2018. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 6,246 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Aboudéia where it started
    3,395 ha reached on 18 Jan
    0.3 %
  2. Bahr-Azoum
    3,204 ha reached on 22 Jan
    0.1 %
  3. Barh-Signaka
    869 ha reached on 22 Jan
    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)
18 Jan 36.1 °C 13 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
19 Jan 36.6 °C 13 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
20 Jan 36.6 °C 13 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
21 Jan 37.7 °C 11 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
22 Jan 38.6 °C 11 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
23 Jan 39.0 °C 10 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
24 Jan 38.7 °C 10 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
25 Jan 39.9 °C 11 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
26 Jan after 39.1 °C 10 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
27 Jan after 38.0 °C 9 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 62
28 Jan after 37.2 °C 8 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
29 Jan after 35.7 °C 10 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
30 Jan after 36.3 °C 9 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 59
31 Jan after 37.6 °C 10 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
1 Feb after 39.6 °C 14 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 59
2 Feb after 39.2 °C 12 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
3 Feb after 39.2 °C 16 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
4 Feb after 40.3 °C 13 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 11 Jan 2019
After · 1 Feb 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.

Detections table · 287Every 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 Chad ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Aboudéia fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 18 January 2019 and 25 January 2019: 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 7,428 hectares (74.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 3 municipalities: Aboudéia (3,395 ha, 0.3 %); Bahr-Azoum (3,204 ha, 0.1 %); Barh-Signaka (869 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 39.9 °C, humidity dropped to 10 % and gusts hit 33 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 57, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Chad (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.

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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.