Guba fire, April 2020 Guba
The fire started on 14 April 2020 in Guba, Ethiopia, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,949 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 338th largest in Beneshangul Gumu since 2016 (of 699 with a page). Number 83 in Ethiopia in 2020, of 177.
- Burnt area
- 2,949ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 5days
- 14 Apr 2020 – 18 Apr 2020
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- districts
- Started on
- 14 Apr
- 2020
- Heat detections
- 91
- in a single hotspot: 55 MW
- Danger at start
- 53
- Extreme · FWI index
- Energy released
- 679MW
- 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 more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
73% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,681 ha in 2016, 255 ha in 2017, 868 ha in 2018, 1,774 ha in 2019. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,162 ha that had burned before.
- 747 ha Quara fire, November 2016 28,159 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 248 ha Guba fire, December 2017 5,347 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 149 ha Guba fire, December 2019 11,110 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 7 ha Guba fire, December 2017 2,283 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Guba where it started2,970 ha reached on 14 Apr0.4 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 14 Apr | 38.7 °C | 8 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 53 |
| 15 Apr | 39.7 °C | 6 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 60 |
| 16 Apr | 39.7 °C | 4 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 59 |
| 17 Apr | 41.3 °C | 2 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 64 |
| 18 Apr | 39.3 °C | 5 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 66 |
| 19 Apr after | 37.3 °C | 8 % | 19 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 58 |
| 20 Apr after | 37.6 °C | 13 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 60 |
| 21 Apr after | 38.4 °C | 7 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 61 |
| 22 Apr after | 39.3 °C | 5 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 58 |
| 23 Apr after | 40.2 °C | 5 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 58 |
| 24 Apr after | 40.1 °C | 7 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 59 |
| 25 Apr after | 40.0 °C | 11 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 66 |
| 26 Apr after | 41.5 °C | 8 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 64 |
| 27 Apr after | 39.9 °C | 14 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 64 |
| 28 Apr after | 40.5 °C | 12 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 64 |
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.
Detections table · 91Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 12,439 haGuba29 December 2025 · 15 days · 5 km away
- 12,870 haGuba21 January 2026 · 19 days · 9 km away
- 28,159 haQuara22 November 2016 · 15 days · 10 km away
- 15,551 haQuara16 November 2017 · 8 days · 36 km away
- 16,681 haQuara10 December 2024 · 15 days · 37 km away
- 15,764 haQuara21 November 2021 · 11 days · 40 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Guba fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 14 April 2020 and 18 April 2020: 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 2,949 hectares (29.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Guba (2,970 ha, 0.4 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 41.3 °C, humidity dropped to 2 % and gusts hit 31 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 66, class Extreme.
- 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
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.