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Dima fire, 20 February 2023 Dima

Out · last detection 24 Feb 2023, 10:55 UTC

The fire started on 20 February 2023 in Dima, Ethiopia, and satellites saw it burning for 4 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,835 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 344th largest in Gambela since 2016 (of 611 with a page). Number 50 in Ethiopia in 2023, of 101.

Burnt area
2,835ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
4days
20 Feb 2023 – 23 Feb 2023
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
20 Feb
2023
Heat detections
70
in a single hotspot: 98 MW
Danger at start
46
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
2.0GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

24 Feb 2023
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 20 Feb23 Feb

How it evolved, day by day

2021222324

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

The weather it burned in

40°high
23km/h · peak gust
15%lowest humidity

It had gone 52 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

96% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,568 ha in 2016, 1,497 ha in 2017, 666 ha in 2019, 1,381 ha in 2021, 256 ha in 2022. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,709 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Dima where it started
    2,856 ha reached on 20 Feb
    0.4 %

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)
20 Feb 38.8 °C 15 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
21 Feb 39.3 °C 18 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
22 Feb 39.5 °C 17 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
23 Feb 39.7 °C 17 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
24 Feb after 39.3 °C 17 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
25 Feb after 37.1 °C 23 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
26 Feb after 40.0 °C 19 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
27 Feb after 38.3 °C 23 % 38 km/h 0.2 mm Very high 47
28 Feb after 37.6 °C 27 % 28 km/h 0.2 mm Very high 45
1 Mar after 35.2 °C 32 % 32 km/h 0.4 mm Very high 40
2 Mar after 37.4 °C 22 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
3 Mar after 37.7 °C 19 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
4 Mar after 39.4 °C 19 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
5 Mar after 38.3 °C 22 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 13 Feb 2023
After · 2 Mar 2023

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 · 70Every 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 20 February 2023 and 23 February 2023: 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 2,835 hectares (28.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Dima (2,856 ha, 0.4 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 39.7 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 23 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 46, 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.