Feshi fire, 1 June 2026 Feshi
The fire started on 1 June 2026 in Feshi, Congo - Kinshasa, and satellites saw it burning for 19 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 33,706 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 7th largest in Kwango since 2016 (of 219 with a page). Number 35 in Congo - Kinshasa in 2026, of 523.
- Burnt area
- 33,706ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 19days
- 1 Jun 2026 – 19 Jun 2026
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- territories
- Started on
- 1 Jun
- 2026
- Heat detections
- 743
- in a single hotspot: 500 MW
- Danger at start
- 24
- High · FWI index
- Energy released
- 23.3GW
- sum of detected power
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone 11 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
90% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 8,663 ha in 2016, 9,267 ha in 2017, 13,139 ha in 2018, 9,123 ha in 2019, 5,540 ha in 2020, 10,664 ha in 2021, 13,308 ha in 2022, 8,794 ha in 2023, 4,471 ha in 2024, 3,078 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 30,417 ha that had burned before.
- 5,350 ha Feshi fire, May 2021 6,664 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,364 ha Feshi fire, June 2016 7,046 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,146 ha Feshi fire, June 2018 5,362 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 38 ha Feshi fire, July 2020 5,700 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Feshi where it started33,942 ha reached on 25 May1.8 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 Jun | 32.0 °C | 28 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 2 Jun | 31.9 °C | 31 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 3 Jun | 32.0 °C | 31 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 4 Jun | 32.0 °C | 26 % | 15 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 23 |
| 5 Jun | 32.0 °C | 28 % | 19 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 6 Jun | 32.0 °C | 28 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 7 Jun | 32.2 °C | 32 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 8 Jun | 30.9 °C | 36 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 9 Jun | 32.6 °C | 28 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 10 Jun | 31.9 °C | 29 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 11 Jun | 32.3 °C | 33 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 12 Jun | 31.9 °C | 25 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 13 Jun | 31.6 °C | 22 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 14 Jun | 31.8 °C | 24 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 15 Jun | 30.6 °C | 31 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 16 Jun | 30.1 °C | 37 % | 20 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 17 Jun | 29.9 °C | 40 % | 27 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 28 |
| 18 Jun | 28.5 °C | 47 % | 27 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 24 |
| 19 Jun | 31.2 °C | 38 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 23 |
| 20 Jun after | 32.3 °C | 38 % | 32 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 27 |
| 21 Jun after | 31.3 °C | 40 % | 27 km/h | 0.4 mm | High 24 |
| 22 Jun after | 29.9 °C | 40 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 23 Jun after | 29.8 °C | 41 % | 20 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 25 |
| 24 Jun after | 31.4 °C | 31 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 25 Jun after | 32.1 °C | 23 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 26 Jun after | 30.8 °C | 24 % | 21 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 27 Jun after | 32.4 °C | 27 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 28 Jun after | 30.1 °C | 38 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 29 Jun after | 30.9 °C | 29 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 30 Jun after | 31.7 °C | 27 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 1 Jul after | 32.0 °C | 27 % | 21 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 2 Jul after | 30.8 °C | 33 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 3 Jul after | 31.5 °C | 34 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 4 Jul after | 33.6 °C | 21 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 5 Jul after | 32.3 °C | 22 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 6 Jul after | 32.7 °C | 20 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
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 · CopernicusOn 7 June 2026 the air beside the fire reached 142 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 94: 6.3 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
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 · 743Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Feshi fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 1 June 2026 and 19 June 2026: 19 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 33,706 hectares (337.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Feshi (33,942 ha, 1.8 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 32.6 °C, humidity dropped to 22 % and gusts hit 41 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 34, 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.
Report an error
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.