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Falessade fire, April 2017 Falessade, Tondon

Out · last detection 23 Apr 2017, 14:10 UTC

The fire started on 13 April 2017 in Falessade, Guinea, and satellites saw it burning for 10 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 6,898 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 22th largest in Kindia since 2016 (of 242 with a page). Number 14 in Guinea in 2017, of 172.

Burnt area
6,898ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
10days
13 Apr 2017 – 22 Apr 2017
Municipalities hit
2
sub-prefectures
Started on
13 Apr
2017
Heat detections
351
in a single hotspot: 295 MW
Danger at start
31
High · FWI index
Energy released
9.6GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

23 Apr 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 13 Apr22 Apr

How it evolved, day by day

1314151617181920212223

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

The weather it burned in

36°high
46km/h · peak gust
28%lowest humidity

It had gone one day without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 3.0 mm on 27 Apr.

This area had burned before

30% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,040 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Falessade where it started
    3,970 ha reached on 7 Apr
    9.2 %
  2. Tondon
    2,972 ha reached on 8 Apr
    3.4 %

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 Apr 34.4 °C 31 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
14 Apr 33.2 °C 33 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
15 Apr 33.5 °C 34 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
16 Apr 32.9 °C 36 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
17 Apr 33.3 °C 35 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
18 Apr 35.5 °C 30 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
19 Apr 34.8 °C 28 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
20 Apr 32.6 °C 33 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
21 Apr 34.0 °C 28 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
22 Apr 32.7 °C 39 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
23 Apr after 32.1 °C 43 % 37 km/h 0.8 mm High 24
24 Apr after 32.6 °C 39 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
25 Apr after 35.6 °C 23 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
26 Apr after 35.4 °C 27 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
27 Apr after 31.8 °C 48 % 32 km/h 3.0 mm Low 8

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 6 Apr 2017
After · 29 Apr 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 · 351Every 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 Guinea ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Falessade fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 13 April 2017 and 22 April 2017: 10 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 6,898 hectares (69.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Falessade (3,970 ha, 9.2 %); Tondon (2,972 ha, 3.4 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 35.5 °C, humidity dropped to 28 % and gusts hit 46 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 37, 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.

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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.