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Bolodou fire, 20 January 2022 Bolodou, Koundou

Out · last detection 24 Jan 2022, 14:42 UTC

The fire started on 20 January 2022 in Bolodou, Guinea, and satellites saw it burning for 4 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,976 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 46th largest in Nzérékoré since 2016 (of 241 with a page). Number 18 in Guinea in 2022, of 107.

Burnt area
3,976ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
4days
20 Jan 2022 – 23 Jan 2022
Municipalities hit
2
sub-prefectures
Started on
20 Jan
2022
Heat detections
103
in a single hotspot: 106 MW
Danger at start
38
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
1.5GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

24 Jan 2022
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 20 Jan23 Jan

How it evolved, day by day

2021222324

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
31km/h · peak gust
11%lowest humidity

It had gone 49 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

88% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,646 ha in 2016, 770 ha in 2017, 1,797 ha in 2018, 1,572 ha in 2020, 1,621 ha in 2021. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,485 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Bolodou where it started
    3,118 ha reached on 20 Jan
    5.9 %
  2. Koundou
    882 ha reached on 21 Jan
    1.9 %

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)
20 Jan 34.4 °C 14 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
21 Jan 34.2 °C 11 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
22 Jan 34.1 °C 13 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
23 Jan 33.7 °C 18 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
24 Jan after 34.8 °C 14 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
25 Jan after 34.7 °C 11 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
26 Jan after 34.4 °C 14 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
27 Jan after 33.2 °C 30 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
28 Jan after 33.7 °C 32 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
29 Jan after 34.6 °C 31 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
30 Jan after 36.9 °C 13 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
31 Jan after 35.3 °C 16 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
1 Feb after 34.7 °C 13 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
2 Feb after 35.8 °C 12 % 31 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 · 13 Jan 2022
After · 30 Jan 2022

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 · 103Every 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 Guinea ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Bolodou fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 20 January 2022 and 23 January 2022: 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 3,976 hectares (39.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Bolodou (3,118 ha, 5.9 %); Koundou (882 ha, 1.9 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 34.4 °C, humidity dropped to 11 % and gusts hit 31 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 41, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Guinea (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

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.

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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 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.