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Dima fire, 11 January 2016 Dima

Out · last detection 14 Jan 2016, 11:08 UTC

The fire started on 11 January 2016 in Dima, Ethiopia, and satellites saw it burning for 4 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 6,966 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 91th largest in Gambela since 2016 (of 611 with a page). Number 36 in Ethiopia in 2016, of 309.

Burnt area
6,966ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
4days
11 Jan 2016 – 14 Jan 2016
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
11 Jan
2016
Heat detections
114
in a single hotspot: 175 MW
Danger at start
35
High · FWI index
Energy released
2.3GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

14 Jan 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 11 Jan14 Jan

How it evolved, day by day

11121314

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

The weather it burned in

38°high
27km/h · peak gust
24%lowest humidity

It had gone 36 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. Dima where it started
    7,018 ha reached on 11 Jan
    0.9 %

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)
11 Jan 38.4 °C 26 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
12 Jan 37.8 °C 28 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
13 Jan 37.0 °C 24 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
14 Jan 37.9 °C 26 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
15 Jan after 35.7 °C 31 % 32 km/h 0.1 mm High 34
16 Jan after 36.5 °C 32 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
17 Jan after 37.4 °C 26 % 17 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
18 Jan after 38.0 °C 19 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
19 Jan after 37.6 °C 21 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
20 Jan after 37.5 °C 19 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
21 Jan after 36.7 °C 22 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
22 Jan after 36.3 °C 30 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
23 Jan after 39.1 °C 19 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
24 Jan after 37.8 °C 20 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm High 38

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 4 Jan 2016
After · 21 Jan 2016

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 · 114Every 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 Dima fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 11 January 2016 and 14 January 2016: 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 6,966 hectares (69.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Dima (7,018 ha, 0.9 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 38.4 °C, humidity dropped to 24 % and gusts hit 27 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 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.