Skip to content
worldfires
CD · Congo - Kinshasa · →

Faradje fire, 16 January 2018 Faradje

Out · last detection 25 Jan 2018, 23:31 UTC

The fire started on 16 January 2018 in Faradje, Congo - Kinshasa, and satellites saw it burning for 10 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 6,342 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 72th largest in Upper Uele since 2016 (of 101 with a page). Number 68 in Congo - Kinshasa in 2018, of 128.

Burnt area
6,342ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
10days
16 Jan 2018 – 25 Jan 2018
Municipalities hit
1
territories
Started on
16 Jan
2018
Heat detections
184
in a single hotspot: 88 MW
Danger at start
42
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
1.4GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

25 Jan 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 16 Jan25 Jan

How it evolved, day by day

16171819202122232425

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
42km/h · peak gust
13%lowest humidity

It had gone 45 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

72% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 3,391 ha in 2016, 2,282 ha in 2017. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 4,553 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Faradje where it started
    6,389 ha reached on 16 Jan
    0.5 %

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)
16 Jan 33.8 °C 13 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
17 Jan 34.0 °C 16 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
18 Jan 34.5 °C 15 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
19 Jan 34.9 °C 13 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
20 Jan 34.2 °C 15 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
21 Jan 35.6 °C 13 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
22 Jan 35.0 °C 13 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
23 Jan 36.3 °C 13 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
24 Jan 34.1 °C 18 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
25 Jan 33.2 °C 20 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
26 Jan after 34.4 °C 14 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
27 Jan after 33.9 °C 15 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
28 Jan after 34.7 °C 14 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
29 Jan after 34.0 °C 12 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
30 Jan after 33.6 °C 11 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
31 Jan after 34.2 °C 13 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
1 Feb after 34.9 °C 12 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
2 Feb after 35.6 °C 14 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
3 Feb after 35.5 °C 17 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
4 Feb after 35.4 °C 17 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 9 Jan 2018
After · 1 Feb 2018

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 · 184Every 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 Faradje fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 16 January 2018 and 25 January 2018: 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 6,342 hectares (63.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Faradje (6,389 ha, 0.5 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 36.3 °C, humidity dropped to 13 % and gusts hit 42 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 53, class Extreme.
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.