Dima fire, 20 January 2025 Dima
The fire started on 20 January 2025 in Dima, Ethiopia, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 12,080 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 38th largest in Gambela since 2016 (of 611 with a page). Number 6 in Ethiopia in 2025, of 127.
- Burnt area
- 12,080ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 8days
- 20 Jan 2025 – 27 Jan 2025
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- districts
- Started on
- 20 Jan
- 2025
- Heat detections
- 411
- in a single hotspot: 198 MW
- Danger at start
- 44
- Very high · FWI index
- Energy released
- 4.2GW
- sum of detected power
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone 55 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
94% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 4,986 ha in 2016, 2,116 ha in 2017, 4,078 ha in 2018, 5,881 ha in 2019, 5,797 ha in 2020, 478 ha in 2021, 1,627 ha in 2022, 1,522 ha in 2023, 2,157 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 11,413 ha that had burned before.
- 3,789 ha Dima fire, January 2016 6,966 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,908 ha Dima fire, February 2020 14,976 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,854 ha Dima fire, January 2019 26,386 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,688 ha Gog fire, February 2020 13,679 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,040 ha Dima fire, January 2019 4,867 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,627 ha Dima fire, January 2022 2,241 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,600 ha Dima fire, January 2018 17,819 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,384 ha Dima fire, January 2017 4,884 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Dima where it started12,169 ha reached on 19 Jan1.6 %
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.
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 19 Jan | 39.9 °C | 18 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 20 Jan | 40.2 °C | 16 % | 20 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 21 Jan | 40.0 °C | 17 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 22 Jan | 39.0 °C | 16 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 23 Jan | 39.0 °C | 20 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 24 Jan | 37.6 °C | 18 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 25 Jan | 38.8 °C | 20 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 26 Jan | 39.1 °C | 15 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 27 Jan | 38.9 °C | 12 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 28 Jan after | 38.7 °C | 10 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 29 Jan after | 38.0 °C | 13 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 30 Jan after | 37.3 °C | 14 % | 19 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 31 Jan after | 37.0 °C | 24 % | 23 km/h | 0.1 mm | Very high 44 |
| 1 Feb after | 39.4 °C | 19 % | 19 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 2 Feb after | 37.8 °C | 20 % | 17 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 3 Feb after | 40.1 °C | 17 % | 18 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 4 Feb after | 39.5 °C | 16 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 51 |
| 5 Feb after | 39.9 °C | 14 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 56 |
| 6 Feb after | 40.0 °C | 13 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 7 Feb after | 40.2 °C | 15 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 8 Feb after | 38.8 °C | 18 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
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 · CopernicusOn 24 January 2025 the air beside the fire reached 103 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 78: 5.2 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
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)
Detections table · 411Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Dima fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 20 January 2025 and 27 January 2025: 8 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 12,080 hectares (120.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Dima (12,169 ha, 1.6 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 40.2 °C, humidity dropped to 10 % and gusts hit 36 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 49, 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.
Report an error
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.