Douako fire, 7 January 2026 Douako
The fire started on 7 January 2026 in Douako, Guinea, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 6,618 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 28th largest in Kankan since 2016 (of 388 with a page). Number 20 in Guinea in 2026, of 269.
- Burnt area
- 6,618ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 7days
- 7 Jan 2026 – 13 Jan 2026
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- sub-prefectures
- Started on
- 7 Jan
- 2026
- Heat detections
- 114
- in a single hotspot: 41 MW
- Danger at start
- 6
- Low · FWI index
- Energy released
- 1.1GW
- 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 0 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
100% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,038 ha in 2016, 996 ha in 2017, 1,944 ha in 2018, 3,967 ha in 2019, 4,466 ha in 2020, 3,610 ha in 2021, 3,502 ha in 2022, 4,237 ha in 2023, 3,751 ha in 2024, 2,919 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 6,647 ha that had burned before.
- 3,389 ha Tokounou fire, February 2022 8,436 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,285 ha Douako fire, January 2024 5,988 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,803 ha Douako fire, January 2020 3,224 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,475 ha Douako fire, February 2019 4,356 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,375 ha Douako fire, January 2021 3,350 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,003 ha Douako fire, January 2023 2,658 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,905 ha Douako fire, January 2023 3,161 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,672 ha Douako fire, January 2018 5,883 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Douako where it started6,661 ha reached on 8 Jan2.3 %
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 Jan | 31.5 °C | 34 % | 35 km/h | 1.5 mm | Low 6 |
| 8 Jan | 28.9 °C | 35 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 13 |
| 9 Jan | 32.1 °C | 28 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 16 |
| 10 Jan | 32.0 °C | 25 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 18 |
| 11 Jan | 33.6 °C | 20 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 21 |
| 12 Jan | 33.6 °C | 20 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 13 Jan | 33.3 °C | 24 % | 16 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 14 Jan after | 33.5 °C | 24 % | 18 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 15 Jan after | 34.0 °C | 27 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 16 Jan after | 33.7 °C | 24 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 17 Jan after | 33.8 °C | 20 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 18 Jan after | 33.7 °C | 28 % | 19 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 19 Jan after | 34.0 °C | 25 % | 20 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 20 Jan after | 31.2 °C | 23 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 21 Jan after | 31.7 °C | 24 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 22 Jan after | 31.2 °C | 22 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 23 Jan after | 32.0 °C | 21 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
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 13 January 2026 the air beside the fire reached 97 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 68: 4.5 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 · 114Every 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 · 14 km away
- 72,176 haAlbadariah7 January 2026 · 48 days · 27 km away
- 12,627 haTokounou11 January 2018 · 15 days · 27 km away
- 12,160 haDouako22 January 2021 · 9 days · 30 km away
- 16,530 haAlbadariahFebruary 2019 · 9 days · 32 km away
- 70,029 haManfranJanuary 2017 · 16 days · 33 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Douako fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 7 January 2026 and 13 January 2026: 7 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 6,618 hectares (66.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Douako (6,661 ha, 2.3 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 33.6 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 38 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 24, class 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.