How long did the Bagata fire last?

GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 13 August 2025 and 23 August 2025: 11 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 9,632 hectares (96.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 3 municipalities: Masi-Manimba (6,561 ha, 0.4 %); Bulungu (2,018 ha, 0.2 %); Bagata (1,109 ha, 0.1 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 37.6 °C, humidity dropped to 21 % and gusts hit 33 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 45, class Very high.

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.

CD · Congo - Kinshasa · 2025-08-13 → 2025-08-23

Bagata fire, 13 August 2025 Masi-Manimba, Bulungu, Bagata

Out · last detection 24 Aug 2025, 23:36 UTC

The fire started on 13 August 2025 in Bagata, Congo - Kinshasa, and satellites saw it burning for 11 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 9,632 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.

It is the 75th largest in Kwilu since 2016 (of 236 with a page). Number 24 in Congo - Kinshasa in 2025, of 118.

Burnt area: 9,632ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 11days; 13 Aug 2025 – 23 Aug 2025
Municipalities hit: 3; territories
Started on: 13 Aug; 2025
Heat detections: 678; in a single hotspot: 137 MW
Danger at start: 34; High · FWI index
Energy released: 6.0GW; sum of detected power

Play back 24 Aug 2025

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 13 Aug23 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

131415161718192021222324

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

The weather it burned in

38°high

33km/h · peak gust

21%lowest humidity

It had gone 18 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 7.4 mm on 31 Aug.

This area had burned before

81% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 3,771 ha in 2016, 2,638 ha in 2017, 1,511 ha in 2018, 3,555 ha in 2019, 4,913 ha in 2020, 2,279 ha in 2021, 641 ha in 2022, 2,718 ha in 2023, 651 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 7,754 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

Masi-Manimba

6,561 ha reached on 8 Aug

0.4 %
Bulungu

2,018 ha reached on 8 Aug

0.2 %
Bagata where it started

1,109 ha reached on 7 Aug

0.1 %

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 Aug	34.7 °C	33 %	23 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
8 Aug	34.5 °C	30 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
9 Aug	33.2 °C	34 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
10 Aug	36.3 °C	25 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
11 Aug	36.2 °C	29 %	23 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
12 Aug	34.7 °C	34 %	23 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
13 Aug	33.0 °C	40 %	26 km/h	0.1 mm	High 31
14 Aug	34.2 °C	33 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
15 Aug	34.3 °C	29 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	High 33
16 Aug	36.1 °C	21 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
17 Aug	36.6 °C	21 %	22 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38
18 Aug	35.5 °C	28 %	23 km/h	0.0 mm	High 38
19 Aug	34.9 °C	29 %	25 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
20 Aug	36.4 °C	28 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
21 Aug	35.2 °C	29 %	32 km/h	0.2 mm	Very high 43
22 Aug	34.9 °C	27 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 41
23 Aug	35.8 °C	24 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 45
24 Aug after	35.7 °C	26 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
25 Aug after	35.3 °C	31 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	High 38
26 Aug after	37.3 °C	29 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38
27 Aug after	36.6 °C	31 %	29 km/h	0.1 mm	Very high 39
28 Aug after	34.9 °C	36 %	27 km/h	3.3 mm	Moderate 12
29 Aug after	37.6 °C	30 %	31 km/h	0.1 mm	High 31
30 Aug after	35.9 °C	31 %	28 km/h	0.5 mm	High 32
31 Aug after	33.2 °C	42 %	27 km/h	7.4 mm	Low 6

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 6 Aug 2025

After · 30 Aug 2025

Before After

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 · Copernicus

On 19 August 2025 the air beside the fire reached 209 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 135: 9.0 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak209 µg/m³

Days over the guideline16 days

PM10214 µg/m³

Optical depth1.87

WHO 15

11121314151617181920212223242526

Good Fair Moderate Poor Very poor Extremely poor

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 · 678Every 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 time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Congo - Kinshasa ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Bagata fire last?: GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 13 August 2025 and 23 August 2025: 11 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 9,632 hectares (96.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 3 municipalities: Masi-Manimba (6,561 ha, 0.4 %); Bulungu (2,018 ha, 0.2 %); Bagata (1,109 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 37.6 °C, humidity dropped to 21 % and gusts hit 33 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 45, class Very high.
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

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · Copernicus ↗

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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.

Where it burned