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Feshi fire, 8 June 2020 Feshi, Kasongo-Lunda

Out · last detection 14 Jun 2020, 11:58 UTC

The fire started on 8 June 2020 in Feshi, Congo - Kinshasa, and satellites saw it burning for 6 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 5,875 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 132th largest in Kwango since 2016 (of 219 with a page). Number 118 in Congo - Kinshasa in 2020, of 165.

Burnt area
5,875ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
6days
8 Jun 2020 – 13 Jun 2020
Municipalities hit
2
territories
Started on
8 Jun
2020
Heat detections
198
in a single hotspot: 227 MW
Danger at start
23
High · FWI index
Energy released
6.4GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

14 Jun 2020
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 8 Jun13 Jun

How it evolved, day by day

8910121314

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

The weather it burned in

31°high
32km/h · peak gust
36%lowest humidity

It had gone 25 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

69% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,012 ha in 2016, 931 ha in 2017, 1,895 ha in 2018, 1,459 ha in 2019. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 4,033 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Feshi where it started
    4,292 ha reached on 8 Jun
    0.2 %
  2. Kasongo-Lunda
    1,622 ha reached on 8 Jun
    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)
8 Jun 31.1 °C 36 % 18 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
9 Jun 30.7 °C 41 % 18 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
10 Jun 28.9 °C 49 % 18 km/h 0.3 mm Moderate 20
11 Jun 28.6 °C 41 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 21
12 Jun 29.0 °C 43 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 21
13 Jun 29.4 °C 36 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
14 Jun after 31.0 °C 30 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
15 Jun after 30.9 °C 27 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
16 Jun after 30.3 °C 28 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
17 Jun after 31.0 °C 21 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
18 Jun after 29.4 °C 26 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
19 Jun after 29.4 °C 27 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
20 Jun after 30.5 °C 24 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
21 Jun after 31.5 °C 22 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
22 Jun after 30.9 °C 21 % 18 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
23 Jun after 31.3 °C 24 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm High 34

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 1 Jun 2020
After · 20 Jun 2020

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 · 198Every 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 Feshi fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 8 June 2020 and 13 June 2020: 6 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 5,875 hectares (58.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Feshi (4,292 ha, 0.2 %); Kasongo-Lunda (1,622 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 31.1 °C, humidity dropped to 36 % and gusts hit 32 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 25, 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.

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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 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.