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Bima fire, July 2021 Bima

Out · last measured on 26 Jul 2021

The fire started on 23 July 2021 in Bima, Indonesia, and satellites saw it burning for 4 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,338 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 18th largest in West Nusa Tenggara since 2016 (of 29 with a page). Number 4 in Indonesia in 2021, of 9.

We have the GWIS perimeter for this fire, but the VIIRS sensors did not capture it in enough detail: no day-by-day evolution, but the split by municipality is there.

Burnt area
2,338ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
4days
23 Jul 2021 – 26 Jul 2021
Municipalities hit
1
regencies
Started on
23 Jul
2021
Danger at start
13
Moderate · FWI index

Where it burned

The weather it burned in

27°high
35km/h · peak gust
52%lowest humidity

It had gone 13 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.2 mm on 5 Aug.

This area had burned before

95% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 961 ha in 2016, 1,402 ha in 2017, 785 ha in 2018, 1,268 ha in 2019. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,226 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Bima where it started
    2,352 ha
    0.6 %

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)
23 Jul 26.9 °C 63 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 13
24 Jul 27.0 °C 53 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 12
25 Jul 26.9 °C 55 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 12
26 Jul 26.7 °C 52 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 12
27 Jul after 26.9 °C 58 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 13
28 Jul after 27.3 °C 58 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 14
29 Jul after 28.0 °C 57 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 15
30 Jul after 27.1 °C 62 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
31 Jul after 27.4 °C 57 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
1 Aug after 27.7 °C 62 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
2 Aug after 27.2 °C 68 % 31 km/h 0.9 mm Low 9
3 Aug after 27.6 °C 66 % 29 km/h 0.6 mm Low 10
4 Aug after 27.0 °C 64 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Low 11
5 Aug after 26.9 °C 64 % 30 km/h 1.2 mm Low 7

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 16 Jul 2021
After · 2 Aug 2021

If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.

Other fires nearby

All fires in Indonesia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Bima fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 23 July 2021 and 26 July 2021: 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 2,338 hectares (23.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Bima (2,352 ha, 0.6 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 27.0 °C, humidity dropped to 52 % and gusts hit 35 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 13, class Moderate.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Indonesia (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: 112

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 112.

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.