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Assosa fire, 7 January 2017 Assosa, Bambasi

Out · last detection 14 Jan 2017, 22:39 UTC

The fire started on 7 January 2017 in Assosa, Ethiopia, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 11,491 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 23th largest in Beneshangul Gumu since 2016 (of 699 with a page). Number 8 in Ethiopia in 2017, of 266.

Burnt area
11,491ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
7days
7 Jan 2017 – 13 Jan 2017
Municipalities hit
2
districts
Started on
7 Jan
2017
Heat detections
383
in a single hotspot: 152 MW
Danger at start
35
High · FWI index
Energy released
4.9GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

14 Jan 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 7 Jan13 Jan

How it evolved, day by day

7891011121314

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
37km/h · peak gust
11%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

78% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 9,925 ha in 2016. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 8,957 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Assosa where it started
    8,813 ha reached on 7 Jan
    2.9 %
  2. Bambasi
    2,747 ha reached on 10 Jan
    2.0 %

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)
7 Jan 27.9 °C 13 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
8 Jan 27.9 °C 14 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
9 Jan 27.7 °C 16 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
10 Jan 29.0 °C 14 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
11 Jan 28.9 °C 13 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
12 Jan 28.7 °C 12 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
13 Jan 28.8 °C 11 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
14 Jan after 28.2 °C 13 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
15 Jan after 28.6 °C 15 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
16 Jan after 29.7 °C 13 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
17 Jan after 28.5 °C 16 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
18 Jan after 29.8 °C 13 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
19 Jan after 29.1 °C 14 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
20 Jan after 28.8 °C 15 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
21 Jan after 28.8 °C 15 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
22 Jan after 30.2 °C 13 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
23 Jan after 29.6 °C 16 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
24 Jan after 29.1 °C 17 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
25 Jan after 29.7 °C 17 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
26 Jan after 28.5 °C 21 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
27 Jan after 29.4 °C 19 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
28 Jan after 29.3 °C 20 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
29 Jan after 28.4 °C 24 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
30 Jan after 28.0 °C 22 % 31 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.

Before · 31 Dec 2016
After · 20 Jan 2017

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 · 383Every 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 Ethiopia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Assosa fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 7 January 2017 and 13 January 2017: 7 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 11,491 hectares (114.9 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Assosa (8,813 ha, 2.9 %); Bambasi (2,747 ha, 2.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 29.8 °C, humidity dropped to 11 % and gusts hit 37 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 42, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Ethiopia (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 ADM3 (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.