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Bole fire, 9 January 2026 Bole, Central Gonja

Out · last detection 1 Feb 2026, 01:18 UTC

The fire started on 9 January 2026 in Bole, Ghana, and satellites saw it burning for 23 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 16,371 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 5th largest in Savannah since 2016 (of 336 with a page). Number 5 in Ghana in 2026, of 179.

The power measured by the satellite is low (29.7 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
16,371ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
23days
9 Jan 2026 – 31 Jan 2026
Municipalities hit
2
districts
Started on
9 Jan
2026
Heat detections
584
in a single hotspot: 30 MW
Danger at start
40
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
3.1GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

1 Feb 2026
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 9 Jan31 Jan

How it evolved, day by day

9101112131415161718192021222324252627282930311

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
34km/h · peak gust
12%lowest humidity

It had gone 24 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

72% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 133 ha in 2016, 813 ha in 2017, 2,306 ha in 2018, 3,506 ha in 2020, 2,177 ha in 2021, 724 ha in 2022, 880 ha in 2023, 8,178 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 11,710 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Bole where it started
    9,202 ha reached on 6 Jan
    1.5 %
  2. Central Gonja
    7,271 ha reached on 11 Jan
    1.0 %

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)
9 Jan 37.0 °C 17 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
10 Jan 37.1 °C 21 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
11 Jan 36.3 °C 19 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
12 Jan 35.3 °C 21 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
13 Jan 36.8 °C 22 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
14 Jan 36.2 °C 31 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
15 Jan 36.6 °C 32 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
16 Jan 36.5 °C 25 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
17 Jan 36.1 °C 22 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
18 Jan 37.2 °C 21 % 15 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
19 Jan 37.1 °C 25 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
20 Jan 36.4 °C 22 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
21 Jan 34.1 °C 24 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
22 Jan 34.8 °C 19 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
23 Jan 35.4 °C 19 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
24 Jan 36.4 °C 16 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
25 Jan 36.2 °C 12 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
26 Jan 36.1 °C 14 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
27 Jan 37.1 °C 16 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
28 Jan 37.1 °C 15 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
29 Jan 36.7 °C 15 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
30 Jan 37.9 °C 19 % 18 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
31 Jan 37.9 °C 23 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
1 Feb after 38.1 °C 30 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
2 Feb after 37.1 °C 38 % 25 km/h 0.6 mm High 32
3 Feb after 35.9 °C 38 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
4 Feb after 38.4 °C 23 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
5 Feb after 38.5 °C 19 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
6 Feb after 37.9 °C 24 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
7 Feb after 37.0 °C 36 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
8 Feb after 38.3 °C 26 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
9 Feb after 38.7 °C 27 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
10 Feb after 36.7 °C 33 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 37

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 2 Jan 2026
After · 7 Feb 2026

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 13 January 2026 the air beside the fire reached 109 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 99: 6.6 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak109 µg/m³
Days over the guideline28 days
PM10282 µg/m³
Optical depth1.24
78910111213141516171819202122232425262728293031123
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 · 584Every 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 Ghana ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Bole fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 9 January 2026 and 31 January 2026: 23 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 16,371 hectares (163.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Bole (9,202 ha, 1.5 %); Central Gonja (7,271 ha, 1.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 37.9 °C, humidity dropped to 12 % and gusts hit 34 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 47, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Ghana (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
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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 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)). 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.