Skip to content
worldfires
ET · Ethiopia · →

Dodola fire, March 2021 Dodola

Out · last measured on 29 Mar 2021

The fire started on 22 March 2021 in Dodola, Ethiopia, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,303 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 93th largest in Oromia since 2016 (of 264 with a page). Number 109 in Ethiopia in 2021, of 255.

We have the GWIS 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
3,303ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
8days
22 Mar 2021 – 29 Mar 2021
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
22 Mar
2021
Danger at start
0
Very low · FWI index

Where it burned

The weather it burned in

17°high
43km/h · peak gust
17%lowest humidity

It had gone 0 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 9.7 mm on 31 Mar.

This area had burned before

22% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 742 ha in 2018.

What happened to each town

  1. Dodola where it started
    3,324 ha
    2.1 %

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)
22 Mar 14.3 °C 37 % 35 km/h 1.0 mm Very low 0
23 Mar 15.2 °C 28 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very low 1
24 Mar 16.1 °C 22 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very low 4
25 Mar 16.7 °C 19 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Low 6
26 Mar 17.0 °C 18 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Low 8
27 Mar 16.2 °C 17 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Low 8
28 Mar 14.3 °C 25 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Low 9
29 Mar 14.5 °C 34 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Low 8
30 Mar after 14.1 °C 38 % 31 km/h 0.1 mm Low 7
31 Mar after 13.6 °C 46 % 44 km/h 9.7 mm Very low 0

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 15 Mar 2021
After · 5 Apr 2021

If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Dodola fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 22 March 2021 and 29 March 2021: 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 3,303 hectares (33.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Dodola (3,324 ha, 2.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 17.0 °C, humidity dropped to 17 % and gusts hit 43 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 9, class Low.
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
What do you think is wrong?

We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy.

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.