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CD · Congo - Kinshasa · →

Bukama fire, June 2018 Bukama

Out · last detection 16 Jun 2018, 11:26 UTC

The fire started on 9 June 2018 in Bukama, Congo - Kinshasa, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 6,034 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 100th largest in Haut-Lomami since 2016 (of 172 with a page). Number 74 in Congo - Kinshasa in 2018, of 128.

Burnt area
6,034ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
7days
9 Jun 2018 – 15 Jun 2018
Municipalities hit
1
territories
Started on
9 Jun
2018
Heat detections
192
in a single hotspot: 81 MW
Danger at start
28
High · FWI index
Energy released
1.4GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

16 Jun 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 9 Jun15 Jun

How it evolved, day by day

910111213141516

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

The weather it burned in

27°high
49km/h · peak gust
22%lowest humidity

It had gone 29 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

64% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 3,555 ha in 2016, 1,162 ha in 2017. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,854 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Bukama where it started
    6,083 ha reached on 2 Jun
    0.3 %

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 Jun 23.8 °C 24 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
10 Jun 24.3 °C 23 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
11 Jun 25.4 °C 24 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
12 Jun 25.1 °C 24 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
13 Jun 24.6 °C 26 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
14 Jun 25.1 °C 28 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
15 Jun 26.7 °C 22 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
16 Jun after 26.7 °C 22 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
17 Jun after 25.5 °C 25 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
18 Jun after 25.1 °C 25 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
19 Jun after 24.2 °C 28 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
20 Jun after 25.0 °C 23 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
21 Jun after 24.7 °C 25 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
22 Jun after 25.0 °C 30 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
23 Jun after 23.5 °C 35 % 38 km/h 0.1 mm High 31
24 Jun after 24.8 °C 31 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
25 Jun after 25.0 °C 33 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 35

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 2 Jun 2018
After · 22 Jun 2018

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 · 192Every 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 Congo - Kinshasa ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Bukama fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 9 June 2018 and 15 June 2018: 7 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 6,034 hectares (60.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Bukama (6,083 ha, 0.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 26.7 °C, humidity dropped to 22 % and gusts hit 49 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 35, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Congo - Kinshasa (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 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.