Douako fire, 7 February 2024 Douako
The fire started on 7 February 2024 in Douako, Guinea, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,121 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 135th largest in Kankan since 2016 (of 388 with a page). Number 31 in Guinea in 2024, of 118.
- Burnt area
- 3,121ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 5days
- 7 Feb 2024 – 11 Feb 2024
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- sub-prefectures
- Started on
- 7 Feb
- 2024
- Heat detections
- 79
- in a single hotspot: 37 MW
- Danger at start
- 47
- Very high · FWI index
- Energy released
- 710MW
- 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 more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
99% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 991 ha in 2016, 1,328 ha in 2017, 933 ha in 2019, 613 ha in 2020, 1,676 ha in 2021, 580 ha in 2023. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,079 ha that had burned before.
- 1,219 ha Douako fire, February 2021 6,587 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 822 ha Douako fire, February 2017 2,823 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 580 ha Douako fire, January 2023 3,161 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 264 ha Douako fire, March 2017 2,884 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 261 ha Douako fire, January 2021 3,350 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 196 ha Douako fire, February 2021 3,412 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 61 ha Douako fire, January 2019 2,456 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 35 ha Douako fire, February 2019 4,356 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Douako where it started3,142 ha reached on 4 Feb1.1 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 7 Feb | 34.6 °C | 13 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 8 Feb | 36.0 °C | 14 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 50 |
| 9 Feb | 36.9 °C | 13 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 10 Feb | 38.0 °C | 15 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 11 Feb | 36.6 °C | 16 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 12 Feb after | 38.4 °C | 17 % | 20 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 13 Feb after | 38.8 °C | 14 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 14 Feb after | 39.0 °C | 13 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 53 |
| 15 Feb after | 39.0 °C | 12 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 50 |
| 16 Feb after | 37.7 °C | 14 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 53 |
| 17 Feb after | 37.4 °C | 15 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 50 |
| 18 Feb after | 37.9 °C | 17 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 19 Feb after | 37.8 °C | 12 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 54 |
| 20 Feb after | 36.4 °C | 11 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 21 Feb after | 35.8 °C | 10 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 50 |
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 10 February 2024 the air beside the fire reached 97 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 62: 4.2 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 · 79Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 13,279 haTokounou25 January 2020 · 9 days · 23 km away
- 72,176 haAlbadariah7 January 2026 · 48 days · 31 km away
- 12,160 haDouako22 January 2021 · 9 days · 32 km away
- 12,627 haTokounou11 January 2018 · 15 days · 35 km away
- 70,029 haManfranJanuary 2017 · 16 days · 36 km away
- 16,530 haAlbadariahFebruary 2019 · 9 days · 36 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Douako fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 7 February 2024 and 11 February 2024: 5 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 3,121 hectares (31.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Douako (3,142 ha, 1.1 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 38.0 °C, humidity dropped to 13 % and gusts hit 33 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 50, class Very high.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Guinea (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 (Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY 3.0 IGO)). 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.