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DZ · Algeria · –

Didouche Mourad fire, August 2020 ديدوش مراد · Didouche Mourad, Zighoud Youcef, Constantine

Out · last measured on 18 Aug 2020

The fire started on 13 August 2020 in Didouche Mourad, Algeria, and satellites saw it burning for 6 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 1,586 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 3 municipalities.

It is the 9th largest in Constantine since 2016 (of 31 with a page). Number 7 in Algeria in 2020, of 236.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Hammam Beni Salah · 2017Ain Kechra · 2020Ibn Badis · 2026Ibn Badis · 2022

We have the Copernicus perimeter for this fire, but the VIIRS sensors did not capture it in enough detail: no day-by-day evolution, but the split by municipality is there.

Burnt area
1,586ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
6days
13 Aug 2020 – 18 Aug 2020
Municipalities hit
3
communes
Started on
13 Aug
2020
Danger at start
49
Very high · FWI index

Where it burned

The weather it burned in

38°high
41km/h · peak gust
21%lowest humidity

It had gone 9 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.6 mm on 28 Aug.

This area had burned before

4% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 23 ha in 2017, 58 ha in 2019. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 63 ha that had burned before.

How big is it?

10 km
It burned the equivalent of 1% of the area of London (16 km² against 1,583 km²).

London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).

This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.

What happened to each town

  1. Didouche Mourad ديدوش مراد 33,266 inhabitants · 5.6 km from the centre where it started
    1,452 ha
    13 %
  2. Zighoud Youcef زيغود يوسف 35,248 inhabitants · 7.0 km from the centre
    92 ha
    0.4 %
  3. Constantine الخروب 179,033 inhabitants · 17.9 km from the centre
    45 ha
    0.2 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the official perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.

What burned

  • Other natural land51 %
  • Mixed forest39 %
  • Agricultural areas9.7 %

Land cover inside the perimeter as reported by Copernicus EFFIS (outside the Corine Land Cover area).

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)
13 Aug 38.1 °C 21 % 36 km/h 1.6 mm Very high 49
14 Aug 36.3 °C 24 % 37 km/h 0.9 mm Very high 39
15 Aug 36.2 °C 21 % 28 km/h 1.0 mm Very high 39
16 Aug 31.9 °C 41 % 41 km/h 0.1 mm High 28
17 Aug 32.0 °C 39 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
18 Aug 32.1 °C 37 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
19 Aug after 33.4 °C 31 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
20 Aug after 40.0 °C 15 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 62
21 Aug after 40.1 °C 15 % 38 km/h 0.6 mm Extreme 58
22 Aug after 34.6 °C 35 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
23 Aug after 30.3 °C 44 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
24 Aug after 29.1 °C 40 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
25 Aug after 30.9 °C 30 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
26 Aug after 31.5 °C 25 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
27 Aug after 33.2 °C 20 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
28 Aug after 35.7 °C 22 % 33 km/h 1.6 mm Very high 44

Its twins: fires that started in the same weather

It started with an FWI of 48.8, a minimum humidity of 21% and 9 days without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2016: 47.

FWI at the start 48.8
Minimum humidity 21 %
Days without rain 9
this fire chosen twins rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar

Outlines of the closest twins

Hammam Beni Salah fire, July 2017
651 ha 4 days FWI 48.7 Min. humidity 21 % 117 km away, in 2017

First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.

See its page Compare with this fire

What happened to them

2 days
median duration
208 ha
median area
11 %
went past 1,000 ha
1.4 mm
rain at the end (median; 31 of 47 had it)

It was 7.6 times larger than the median of its twins and lasted 6 days, against 2 days.

Only 4 of its 47 twins burned more. The weather on the first day does not explain everything: the wind in the following days, the fuel and the firefighting also count. In 16 of 47, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 1.4 mm.

This is a bank of analogues: it shows what usually happens, not what will happen. With fewer than 15 twins we give no figures. How we calculate it

How it ended

1.6 mmfirst rain
28 Aug10 days after it ended
41km/h · max. gust

It was considered over on 18 Aug, and on 28 Aug 1.6 mm fell. We do not know whether the rain or the firefighters put it out. Twins with rain when they ended: 31 of 47, with a median of 1.4 mm.

Weather on this page: Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)

How a twin is chosen

  • Same area: fires that have already ended, less than 250 km from this one, since 2016.
  • Same start: we compare the FWI on the first day, the minimum humidity that day and the run of days without rain before it. The slider sets how much they may differ.
  • Only pages with final weather data (ERA5 reanalysis) calculated in the same way as this fire’s; agricultural and grass burns and pages with data under review are left out.
  • Fires burning at the same time as this one (a week before or after) are left out: they share the same spell of weather and do not count as a precedent.
  • They are sorted by similarity, and the outlines of the first five are drawn.

How we calculate it

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 6 Aug 2020
After · 25 Aug 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.

The smoke

CAMS · Copernicus

On 20 August 2020 the air beside the fire reached 37 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 26: 1.7 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak37 µg/m³
Days over the guideline2 days
PM1064 µg/m³
11 Aug14 Aug17 Aug20 Aug
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)

Other fires nearby

All fires in Algeria

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Didouche Mourad fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 13 August 2020 and 18 August 2020: 6 days between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 1,586 hectares (15.9 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 3 municipalities: Didouche Mourad (1,452 ha, 13 %); Zighoud Youcef (92 ha, 0.4 %); Constantine (45 ha, 0.2 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The fire started in Didouche Mourad and came within 5.6 km of its centre. That is the distance from the perimeter, or the nearest hotspot, to the point marking the centre; it does not mean it entered the houses.
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 38.1 °C, humidity dropped to 21 % and gusts hit 41 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 49, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Algeria (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.
How did the fires that started in similar weather in this area end?
Fires less than 250 km away that started since 2016 with a similar FWI, humidity and dry spell: 47. Their median duration was 2 days and their median area 208 ha; 11 % went past 1,000 ha. Only 4 of its 47 twins burned more. The weather on the first day does not explain everything: the wind in the following days, the fuel and the firefighting also count. In 16 of 47, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 1.4 mm.

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: 14 · 1021 · Emergency number and official warnings

Satellite cross-check

History of this page Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.

No changes since 24 October 2026.

RSS Changes to this page With cross-checks and a citable version

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
What do you think is wrong?

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 14 · 1021.

How we know this
  • Perimeter: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
  • Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. No Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
  • We have not matched this page with any official record.
  • Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.

How we build fire pages: methodology

Where this data comes from

The perimeter and land cover come from the Copernicus European Forest Fire Information System (EFFIS), measured on MODIS and Sentinel-2 imagery and published under CC BY 4.0. 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-ShareAlike 2.0). The area per municipality is computed by WorldFires by crossing the perimeter with those boundaries, so it may differ slightly from each country’s official figure.