Skip to content
worldfires
CD · Congo - Kinshasa · →

Dungu fire, 13 January 2017 Dungu, Faradje

Out · last detection 21 Jan 2017, 23:50 UTC

The fire started on 13 January 2017 in Dungu, Congo - Kinshasa, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 58,675 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 4th largest in Upper Uele since 2016 (of 101 with a page). The largest in Congo - Kinshasa in 2017, of 138.

Burnt area
58,675ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
8days
13 Jan 2017 – 20 Jan 2017
Municipalities hit
2
territories
Started on
13 Jan
2017
Heat detections
1,787
in a single hotspot: 310 MW
Danger at start
40
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
28.7GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

21 Jan 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 13 Jan20 Jan

How it evolved, day by day

131415161718192021

Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.

The weather it burned in

38°high
40km/h · peak gust
9%lowest humidity

It had gone 28 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 2.4 mm on 25 Jan.

This area had burned before

26% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 15,366 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Dungu where it started
    57,874 ha reached on 12 Jan
    1.7 %
  2. Faradje
    1,184 ha reached on 18 Jan
    0.1 %

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)
13 Jan 35.7 °C 12 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
14 Jan 35.4 °C 15 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
15 Jan 37.2 °C 12 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
16 Jan 37.9 °C 11 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
17 Jan 38.3 °C 9 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
18 Jan 37.1 °C 12 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
19 Jan 36.6 °C 14 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
20 Jan 37.9 °C 15 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
21 Jan after 37.3 °C 15 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
22 Jan after 38.2 °C 15 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
23 Jan after 38.7 °C 12 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
24 Jan after 34.1 °C 28 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
25 Jan after 34.5 °C 31 % 31 km/h 2.4 mm Moderate 18

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 6 Jan 2017
After · 27 Jan 2017

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

Detections table · 1,787Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
⬇ Download CSV Times in UTC. Each detection is a 375 m pixel: a large fire yields hundreds per pass.
Date and timeSatelliteFRP (MW)LatLon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Congo - Kinshasa ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Dungu fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 13 January 2017 and 20 January 2017: 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 58,675 hectares (586.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Dungu (57,874 ha, 1.7 %); Faradje (1,184 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 38.3 °C, humidity dropped to 9 % and gusts hit 40 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 Congo - Kinshasa (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 ADM2 (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.