Dungu fire, January 2019 Dungu
The fire started on 19 January 2019 in Dungu, Congo - Kinshasa, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 7,416 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 54th largest in Upper Uele since 2016 (of 101 with a page). Number 46 in Congo - Kinshasa in 2019, of 115.
- Burnt area
- 7,416ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 7days
- 19 Jan 2019 – 25 Jan 2019
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- territories
- Started on
- 19 Jan
- 2019
- Heat detections
- 215
- in a single hotspot: 112 MW
- Danger at start
- 29
- High · FWI index
- Energy released
- 3.8GW
- 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 2 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.6 mm on 29 Jan.
This area had burned before
98% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 5,672 ha in 2016, 5,492 ha in 2017, 2,460 ha in 2018. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 7,242 ha that had burned before.
- 3,920 ha Dungu fire, January 2016 38,657 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,549 ha Dungu fire, January 2017 38,040 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 835 ha Dungu fire, January 2018 10,582 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Dungu where it started7,469 ha reached on 19 Jan0.2 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 19 Jan | 33.9 °C | 23 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 20 Jan | 33.5 °C | 24 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 21 Jan | 34.9 °C | 21 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 22 Jan | 34.1 °C | 20 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 23 Jan | 34.4 °C | 18 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 24 Jan | 35.4 °C | 17 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 25 Jan | 36.2 °C | 20 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 35 |
| 26 Jan after | 34.9 °C | 24 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 27 Jan after | 34.8 °C | 26 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 38 |
| 28 Jan after | 34.6 °C | 30 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 29 Jan after | 33.1 °C | 42 % | 30 km/h | 1.6 mm | Moderate 16 |
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.
Detections table · 215Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 43,011 haDungu1 February 2024 · 10 days · 4 km away
- 38,657 haDungu2 January 2016 · 13 days · 12 km away
- 35,499 haDungu14 January 2023 · 9 days · 15 km away
- 38,040 haDungu9 January 2017 · 5 days · 17 km away
- 58,059 haDungu12 January 2026 · 26 days · 21 km away
- 123,194 haDungu22 January 2020 · 9 days · 29 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Dungu fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 19 January 2019 and 25 January 2019: 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 7,416 hectares (74.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Dungu (7,469 ha, 0.2 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 36.2 °C, humidity dropped to 17 % and gusts hit 33 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 35, class 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
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.