Skip to content
worldfires
CD · Congo - Kinshasa · →

Feshi fire, 26 June 2024 Feshi, Kahemba

Out · last detection 3 Jul 2024, 12:49 UTC

The fire started on 26 June 2024 in Feshi, Congo - Kinshasa, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 5,282 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 183th largest in Kwango since 2016 (of 219 with a page). Number 123 in Congo - Kinshasa in 2024, of 133.

Burnt area
5,282ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
7days
26 Jun 2024 – 2 Jul 2024
Municipalities hit
2
territories
Started on
26 Jun
2024
Heat detections
163
in a single hotspot: 191 MW
Danger at start
45
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
4.8GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

3 Jul 2024
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 26 Jun2 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

262728293023

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

The weather it burned in

32°high
45km/h · peak gust
17%lowest humidity

It had gone 43 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

100% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 3,110 ha in 2016, 3,654 ha in 2017, 2,579 ha in 2018, 2,003 ha in 2019, 3,053 ha in 2020, 2,242 ha in 2021, 2,037 ha in 2022, 3,452 ha in 2023. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 5,290 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Feshi where it started
    4,375 ha reached on 24 Jun
    0.2 %
  2. Kahemba
    945 ha reached on 26 Jun
    0.0 %

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)
26 Jun 31.1 °C 22 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
27 Jun 31.6 °C 19 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
28 Jun 31.9 °C 17 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
29 Jun 31.9 °C 21 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
30 Jun 32.1 °C 23 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
1 Jul 32.5 °C 25 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
2 Jul 32.2 °C 23 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
3 Jul after 32.8 °C 19 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
4 Jul after 32.7 °C 20 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
5 Jul after 32.4 °C 21 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
6 Jul after 32.2 °C 21 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
7 Jul after 31.5 °C 26 % 18 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
8 Jul after 30.8 °C 25 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
9 Jul after 32.4 °C 21 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
10 Jul after 31.9 °C 15 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
11 Jul after 31.9 °C 13 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
12 Jul after 32.1 °C 20 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 19 Jun 2024
After · 9 Jul 2024

If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.

The smoke

CAMS · Copernicus

On 27 June 2024 the air beside the fire reached 63 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 43: 2.9 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak63 µg/m³
Days over the guideline12 days
PM1090 µg/m³
Optical depth1.13
2425262728293012345
Good Fair Moderate Poor Very poor Extremely poor

Particles from the Copernicus CAMS model at the centre of the perimeter; these are not measurements in each town. The pale bar is the worst hour, the solid one the daily average.

Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS)

Detections table · 163Every 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 26 June 2024 and 2 July 2024: 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 5,282 hectares (52.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Feshi (4,375 ha, 0.2 %); Kahemba (945 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 32.5 °C, humidity dropped to 17 % and gusts hit 45 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 46, 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.

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.