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Bandafassi fire, 12 December 2017 Bandafassi

Out · last detection 16 Dec 2017, 02:20 UTC

The fire started on 12 December 2017 in Bandafassi, Senegal, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,827 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 70th largest in Kédougou since 2016 (of 116 with a page). Number 29 in Senegal in 2017, of 75.

The power measured by the satellite is low (26.4 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.

Burnt area
2,827ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
5days
12 Dec 2017 – 16 Dec 2017
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
12 Dec
2017
Heat detections
65
in a single hotspot: 26 MW
Danger at start
41
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
362MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

16 Dec 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 12 Dec16 Dec

How it evolved, day by day

12131416

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

The weather it burned in

34°high
33km/h · peak gust
19%lowest humidity

It had gone 56 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

  1. Bandafassi where it started
    2,847 ha reached on 11 Dec
    0.5 %

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)
12 Dec 34.2 °C 21 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
13 Dec 33.5 °C 21 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
14 Dec 33.0 °C 22 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
15 Dec 32.5 °C 23 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
16 Dec 34.0 °C 19 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
17 Dec after 34.9 °C 21 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
18 Dec after 33.7 °C 19 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
19 Dec after 34.5 °C 19 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
20 Dec after 32.8 °C 22 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
21 Dec after 30.7 °C 26 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
22 Dec after 29.2 °C 23 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
23 Dec after 28.5 °C 23 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
24 Dec after 30.5 °C 22 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
25 Dec after 33.3 °C 22 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
26 Dec after 34.3 °C 21 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 5 Dec 2017
After · 23 Dec 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 · 65Every 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 Senegal ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Bandafassi fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 12 December 2017 and 16 December 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 2,827 hectares (28.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Bandafassi (2,847 ha, 0.5 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 34.2 °C, humidity dropped to 19 % and gusts hit 33 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 44, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Senegal (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.

Emergency number: 18

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
What do you think is wrong?

We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy. This is not an emergency service: if there is a fire now, call 18.

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 (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.