Douako fire, 23 February 2024 Douako
The fire started on 23 February 2024 in Douako, Guinea, and satellites saw it burning for 4 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,708 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 190th largest in Kankan since 2016 (of 388 with a page). Number 46 in Guinea in 2024, of 118.
- Burnt area
- 2,708ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 4days
- 23 Feb 2024 – 26 Feb 2024
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- sub-prefectures
- Started on
- 23 Feb
- 2024
- Heat detections
- 103
- in a single hotspot: 124 MW
- Danger at start
- 51
- Extreme · FWI index
- Energy released
- 720MW
- 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
78% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 153 ha in 2016, 812 ha in 2017, 258 ha in 2019, 30 ha in 2021, 1,212 ha in 2022, 865 ha in 2023. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,116 ha that had burned before.
- 1,048 ha Douako fire, February 2022 3,962 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 856 ha Douako fire, February 2023 3,964 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 232 ha Douako fire, March 2019 2,055 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 164 ha Douako fire, January 2022 2,611 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 30 ha Douako fire, February 2021 3,450 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 9 ha Douako fire, February 2023 2,074 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Douako where it started2,725 ha reached on 20 Feb1.0 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 23 Feb | 34.3 °C | 11 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 51 |
| 24 Feb | 36.5 °C | 10 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 25 Feb | 37.8 °C | 5 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 53 |
| 26 Feb | 37.5 °C | 16 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 27 Feb after | 37.6 °C | 20 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 28 Feb after | 38.2 °C | 16 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 51 |
| 29 Feb after | 38.3 °C | 13 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 51 |
| 1 Mar after | 38.3 °C | 20 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 51 |
| 2 Mar after | 36.5 °C | 29 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 3 Mar after | 38.0 °C | 17 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 4 Mar after | 37.0 °C | 26 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 5 Mar after | 37.8 °C | 21 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 6 Mar after | 38.8 °C | 16 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 7 Mar after | 38.7 °C | 19 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
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 23 February 2024 the air beside the fire reached 108 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 83: 5.5 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 · 103Every 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 Douako fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 23 February 2024 and 26 February 2024: 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 2,708 hectares (27.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Douako (2,725 ha, 1.0 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 37.8 °C, humidity dropped to 5 % and gusts hit 32 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 53, class Extreme.
- 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.