Skip to content
worldfires
ET · Ethiopia · →

Guba fire, 4 November 2016 Guba

Out · last detection 9 Nov 2016, 10:42 UTC

The fire started on 4 November 2016 in Guba, Ethiopia, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,140 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 300th largest in Beneshangul Gumu since 2016 (of 699 with a page). Number 133 in Ethiopia in 2016, of 309.

The power measured by the satellite is low (11.4 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.

Burnt area
3,140ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
5days
4 Nov 2016 – 8 Nov 2016
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
4 Nov
2016
Heat detections
86
in a single hotspot: 11 MW
Danger at start
35
High · FWI index
Energy released
309MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

9 Nov 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 4 Nov8 Nov

How it evolved, day by day

456789

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

The weather it burned in

37°high
30km/h · peak gust
15%lowest humidity

It had gone 20 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

  1. Guba where it started
    3,159 ha reached on 2 Nov
    0.4 %

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)
4 Nov 36.3 °C 15 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
5 Nov 36.9 °C 15 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
6 Nov 37.0 °C 16 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
7 Nov 36.9 °C 19 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
8 Nov 35.4 °C 21 % 30 km/h 0.1 mm Very high 38
9 Nov after 35.3 °C 21 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
10 Nov after 36.2 °C 21 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
11 Nov after 36.5 °C 18 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
12 Nov after 36.7 °C 15 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
13 Nov after 37.4 °C 15 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
14 Nov after 36.8 °C 12 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
15 Nov after 37.3 °C 12 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
16 Nov after 37.2 °C 12 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
17 Nov after 38.2 °C 12 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
18 Nov after 36.6 °C 18 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 28 Oct 2016
After · 15 Nov 2016

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 · 86Every 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 Ethiopia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Guba fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 4 November 2016 and 8 November 2016: 5 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 3,140 hectares (31.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Guba (3,159 ha, 0.4 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 37.0 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 30 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 38, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Ethiopia (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 ADM3 (Open Data Commons Open Database License 1.0). 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.