Ango fire, 1 February 2026 Ango
The fire started on 1 February 2026 in Ango, Congo - Kinshasa, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 11,413 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 9th largest in Lower Uele since 2016 (of 48 with a page). Number 149 in Congo - Kinshasa in 2026, of 523.
- Burnt area
- 11,413ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 5days
- 1 Feb 2026 – 5 Feb 2026
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- territories
- Started on
- 1 Feb
- 2026
- Heat detections
- 375
- in a single hotspot: 145 MW
- Danger at start
- 42
- Very high · FWI index
- Energy released
- 3.8GW
- sum of detected power
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone 52 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
93% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 198 ha in 2016, 4,188 ha in 2017, 7,540 ha in 2018, 4,471 ha in 2020, 3,197 ha in 2021, 3,941 ha in 2022, 1,471 ha in 2023, 8,166 ha in 2024, 6,427 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 10,591 ha that had burned before.
- 8,166 ha Ango fire, February 2024 28,374 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 5,503 ha Ango fire, January 2025 8,014 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,627 ha Ango fire, December 2018 5,604 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,253 ha Ango fire, January 2017 6,518 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 226 ha Ango fire, December 2018 7,010 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 198 ha Ango fire, January 2016 19,692 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Ango where it started11,493 ha reached on 31 Jan0.3 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 31 Jan | 34.1 °C | 20 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 1 Feb | 31.8 °C | 29 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 2 Feb | 34.5 °C | 20 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 3 Feb | 36.4 °C | 18 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 4 Feb | 36.9 °C | 13 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 5 Feb | 35.8 °C | 15 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 50 |
| 6 Feb after | 32.8 °C | 33 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 7 Feb after | 33.0 °C | 25 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 8 Feb after | 34.6 °C | 23 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 9 Feb after | 31.5 °C | 33 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 38 |
| 10 Feb after | 30.4 °C | 35 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 11 Feb after | 34.9 °C | 24 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 35 |
| 12 Feb after | 35.0 °C | 24 % | 21 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 13 Feb after | 35.6 °C | 24 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 35 |
| 14 Feb after | 34.2 °C | 24 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 38 |
| 15 Feb after | 33.6 °C | 27 % | 28 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 37 |
| 16 Feb after | 33.6 °C | 31 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 38 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
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 · CopernicusOn 8 February 2026 the air beside the fire reached 79 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 43: 2.9 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
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 · 375Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Ango fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 1 February 2026 and 5 February 2026: 5 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 11,413 hectares (114.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Ango (11,493 ha, 0.3 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 36.9 °C, humidity dropped to 13 % and gusts hit 33 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 50, class Extreme.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Congo - Kinshasa (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.
Report an error
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.