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Decha fire, 31 December 2016 Decha

Out · last detection 9 Jan 2017, 22:34 UTC

The fire started on 31 December 2016 in Decha, Ethiopia, and satellites saw it burning for 10 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 5,653 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 20th largest in SNNPR since 2016 (of 186 with a page). Number 51 in Ethiopia in 2016, of 309.

Burnt area
5,653ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
10days
31 Dec 2016 – 9 Jan 2017
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
31 Dec
2016
Heat detections
252
in a single hotspot: 56 MW
Danger at start
30
High · FWI index
Energy released
1.2GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

9 Jan 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 31 Dec9 Jan

How it evolved, day by day

31123456789

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

The weather it burned in

36°high
27km/h · peak gust
8%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

  1. Decha where it started
    5,688 ha reached on 26 Dec
    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)
31 Dec 35.1 °C 18 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
1 Jan 35.4 °C 8 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
2 Jan 35.7 °C 12 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
3 Jan 35.6 °C 15 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
4 Jan 35.7 °C 10 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
5 Jan 35.1 °C 11 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
6 Jan 35.1 °C 8 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
7 Jan 35.3 °C 10 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
8 Jan 35.6 °C 11 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
9 Jan 35.6 °C 13 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
10 Jan after 35.4 °C 6 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
11 Jan after 35.6 °C 10 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
12 Jan after 34.8 °C 10 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
13 Jan after 35.0 °C 14 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
14 Jan after 35.9 °C 12 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
15 Jan after 36.5 °C 12 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
16 Jan after 36.4 °C 12 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
17 Jan after 35.3 °C 15 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
18 Jan after 35.6 °C 11 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
19 Jan after 35.7 °C 17 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 24 Dec 2016
After · 16 Jan 2017

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 · 252Every 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 Ethiopia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Decha fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 31 December 2016 and 9 January 2017: 10 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 5,653 hectares (56.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Decha (5,688 ha, 1.9 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 35.7 °C, humidity dropped to 8 % and gusts hit 27 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 40, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Ethiopia (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 (Open Data Commons Open Database License 1.0). 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.