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Feshi fire, July 2021 Feshi, Kahemba

Out · last detection 22 Jul 2021, 12:43 UTC

The fire started on 16 July 2021 in Feshi, Congo - Kinshasa, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 5,831 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 135th largest in Kwango since 2016 (of 219 with a page). Number 67 in Congo - Kinshasa in 2021, of 97.

Burnt area
5,831ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
7days
16 Jul 2021 – 22 Jul 2021
Municipalities hit
2
territories
Started on
16 Jul
2021
Heat detections
201
in a single hotspot: 265 MW
Danger at start
48
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
4.8GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

22 Jul 2021
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 16 Jul22 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

1618192122

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

The weather it burned in

33°high
44km/h · peak gust
19%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

97% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 3,651 ha in 2016, 3,137 ha in 2017, 4,434 ha in 2018, 2,870 ha in 2019, 2,448 ha in 2020. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 5,667 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Feshi where it started
    3,902 ha reached on 16 Jul
    0.2 %
  2. Kahemba
    1,970 ha reached on 19 Jul
    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)
16 Jul 32.6 °C 21 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
17 Jul 31.5 °C 22 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
18 Jul 31.4 °C 22 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
19 Jul 32.5 °C 20 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
20 Jul 32.0 °C 20 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
21 Jul 32.1 °C 19 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
22 Jul 32.5 °C 20 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
23 Jul after 32.0 °C 22 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
24 Jul after 31.0 °C 25 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
25 Jul after 31.1 °C 25 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
26 Jul after 30.9 °C 20 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
27 Jul after 31.1 °C 12 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
28 Jul after 31.3 °C 15 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
29 Jul after 32.1 °C 19 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
30 Jul after 32.6 °C 21 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
31 Jul after 32.8 °C 19 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
1 Aug after 31.4 °C 17 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 9 Jul 2021
After · 29 Jul 2021

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 · 201Every 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 16 July 2021 and 22 July 2021: 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 5,831 hectares (58.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Feshi (3,902 ha, 0.2 %); Kahemba (1,970 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 32.6 °C, humidity dropped to 19 % and gusts hit 44 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 48, class Very 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.