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Fallou fire, December 2019 Fallou

Out · last detection 20 Dec 2019, 14:05 UTC

The fire started on 18 December 2019 in Fallou, Mali, and satellites saw it burning for 3 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,750 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 52th largest in Koulikouro since 2016 (of 119 with a page). Number 13 in Mali in 2019, of 37.

Burnt area
2,750ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
3days
18 Dec 2019 – 20 Dec 2019
Municipalities hit
1
communes
Started on
18 Dec
2019
Heat detections
76
in a single hotspot: 61 MW
Danger at start
55
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
640MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

20 Dec 2019
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 18 Dec20 Dec

How it evolved, day by day

181920

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

The weather it burned in

34°high
34km/h · peak gust
10%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

52% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,435 ha in 2018.

What happened to each town

  1. Fallou where it started
    2,768 ha reached on 18 Dec
    0.9 %

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)
18 Dec 34.5 °C 10 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
19 Dec 33.3 °C 12 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
20 Dec 33.0 °C 14 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
21 Dec after 34.2 °C 11 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
22 Dec after 35.0 °C 11 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
23 Dec after 35.5 °C 10 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
24 Dec after 33.6 °C 10 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
25 Dec after 34.6 °C 11 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
26 Dec after 33.9 °C 10 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
27 Dec after 34.0 °C 11 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
28 Dec after 33.4 °C 12 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
29 Dec after 33.0 °C 12 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
30 Dec after 32.3 °C 12 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 11 Dec 2019
After · 27 Dec 2019

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 · 76Every 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 Mali ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Fallou fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 18 December 2019 and 20 December 2019: 3 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 2,750 hectares (27.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Fallou (2,768 ha, 0.9 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 34.5 °C, humidity dropped to 10 % and gusts hit 34 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 55, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Mali (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 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)). 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.