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Bandafassi fire, 29 December 2023 Bandafassi, Missira

Out · last detection 2 Jan 2024, 13:28 UTC

The fire started on 29 December 2023 in Bandafassi, Senegal, and satellites saw it burning for 4 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 9,261 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 14th largest in Kédougou since 2016 (of 116 with a page). Number 5 in Senegal in 2023, of 83.

Burnt area
9,261ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
4days
29 Dec 2023 – 1 Jan 2024
Municipalities hit
2
districts
Started on
29 Dec
2023
Heat detections
314
in a single hotspot: 95 MW
Danger at start
53
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
2.2GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

2 Jan 2024
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 29 Dec1 Jan

How it evolved, day by day

29303112

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

The weather it burned in

40°high
34km/h · peak gust
12%lowest humidity

It had gone 58 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

95% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 5,417 ha in 2016, 6,517 ha in 2017, 248 ha in 2018, 19 ha in 2019, 4,728 ha in 2020, 4,845 ha in 2021, 740 ha in 2022. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 8,781 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Bandafassi where it started
    9,305 ha reached on 27 Dec
    1.6 %
  2. Missira
    18 ha
    0.0 %

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)
27 Dec 40.2 °C 12 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
28 Dec 38.5 °C 17 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
29 Dec 38.6 °C 14 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
30 Dec 38.4 °C 16 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
31 Dec 37.5 °C 16 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
1 Jan 38.4 °C 15 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
2 Jan after 38.3 °C 17 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
3 Jan after 38.6 °C 17 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
4 Jan after 37.6 °C 26 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
5 Jan after 36.7 °C 19 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
6 Jan after 37.6 °C 11 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
7 Jan after 38.7 °C 12 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
8 Jan after 38.5 °C 11 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
9 Jan after 37.8 °C 15 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
10 Jan after 35.9 °C 20 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
11 Jan after 38.6 °C 16 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 22 Dec 2023
After · 8 Jan 2024

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 · 314Every 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 29 December 2023 and 1 January 2024: 4 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 9,261 hectares (92.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Bandafassi (9,305 ha, 1.6 %); Missira (18 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 40.2 °C, humidity dropped to 12 % and gusts hit 34 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 54, class Extreme.
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.