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Diankabou fire, October 2020 Diankabou, Dianwély

Out · last detection 20 Oct 2020, 13:46 UTC

The fire started on 19 October 2020 in Diankabou, Mali, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,573 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 90th largest in Mopti since 2016 (of 160 with a page). Number 32 in Mali in 2020, of 61.

The power measured by the satellite is low (22.5 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
2,573ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
2days
19 Oct 2020 – 20 Oct 2020
Municipalities hit
2
communes
Started on
19 Oct
2020
Heat detections
67
in a single hotspot: 23 MW
Energy released
350MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

20 Oct 2020
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 19 Oct20 Oct

How it evolved, day by day

1920

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

This area had burned before

44% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,130 ha in 2019.

What happened to each town

  1. Diankabou where it started
    1,812 ha reached on 19 Oct
    1.5 %
  2. Dianwély
    778 ha reached on 19 Oct
    3.6 %

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.

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 12 Oct 2020
After · 27 Oct 2020

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 · 67Every 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 Mali ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Diankabou fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 19 October 2020 and 20 October 2020: 2 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 2,573 hectares (25.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Diankabou (1,812 ha, 1.5 %); Dianwély (778 ha, 3.6 %).
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Mali (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 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.