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Ayod fire, March 2017 Ayod

Out · last detection 22 Mar 2017, 23:23 UTC

The fire started on 18 March 2017 in Ayod, South Sudan, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 5,365 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 373th largest in Jonglei since 2016 (of 427 with a page). Number 182 in South Sudan in 2017, of 203.

Burnt area
5,365ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
5days
18 Mar 2017 – 22 Mar 2017
Municipalities hit
1
counties
Started on
18 Mar
2017
Heat detections
161
in a single hotspot: 122 MW
Danger at start
36
High · FWI index
Energy released
2.6GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

22 Mar 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 18 Mar22 Mar

How it evolved, day by day

1819202122

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

The weather it burned in

42°high
45km/h · peak gust
8%lowest humidity

It had gone 0 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

81% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 6,059 ha in 2016. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 4,369 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Ayod where it started
    5,405 ha reached on 18 Mar
    0.4 %

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 Mar 40.1 °C 20 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
19 Mar 41.5 °C 16 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
20 Mar 40.4 °C 8 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 65
21 Mar 40.4 °C 8 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 59
22 Mar 40.3 °C 8 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
23 Mar after 39.8 °C 17 % 37 km/h 0.2 mm Extreme 55
24 Mar after 41.5 °C 14 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
25 Mar after 39.3 °C 24 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
26 Mar after 38.4 °C 27 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
27 Mar after 40.8 °C 9 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 62
28 Mar after 40.6 °C 7 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 65
29 Mar after 39.9 °C 22 % 32 km/h 0.2 mm Very high 47
30 Mar after 38.8 °C 22 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
31 Mar after 39.5 °C 16 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
1 Apr after 41.3 °C 17 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 11 Mar 2017
After · 29 Mar 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 · 161Every 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 South Sudan ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Ayod fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 18 March 2017 and 22 March 2017: 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 5,365 hectares (53.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Ayod (5,405 ha, 0.4 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 41.5 °C, humidity dropped to 8 % and gusts hit 45 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 65, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of South Sudan (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.