Guintéguéla fire, December 2025 Guintéguéla, Gouiné
The fire started on 15 December 2025 in Guintéguéla, Côte d’Ivoire, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,344 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.
It is the 7th largest in Woroba since 2016 (of 128 with a page). Number 32 in Côte d’Ivoire in 2025, of 144.
The power measured by the satellite is low (21.4 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
- 3,344ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 8days
- 15 Dec 2025 – 22 Dec 2025
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- sub-prefectures
- Started on
- 15 Dec
- 2025
- Heat detections
- 50
- in a single hotspot: 21 MW
- Danger at start
- 6
- Low · FWI index
- Energy released
- 325MW
- 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 0 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: 3,781 ha in 2017, 161 ha in 2018, 1,918 ha in 2019, 2,784 ha in 2020, 543 ha in 2021, 3,674 ha in 2022, 1,137 ha in 2023. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,337 ha that had burned before.
- 2,448 ha Gouiné fire, December 2017 25,038 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,292 ha Gouiné fire, January 2022 3,626 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,663 ha Guintéguéla fire, December 2019 9,951 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,380 ha Sifié fire, December 2022 10,668 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,333 ha Gouiné fire, January 2017 6,269 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,137 ha Gouiné fire, December 2023 3,073 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,121 ha Guintéguéla fire, December 2020 2,143 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 963 ha Gouiné fire, January 2019 1,874 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Guintéguéla where it started3,048 ha reached on 15 Dec2.1 %
-
317 ha reached on 15 Dec0.2 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 15 Dec | 32.9 °C | 40 % | 30 km/h | 1.5 mm | Low 6 |
| 16 Dec | 31.6 °C | 35 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 14 |
| 17 Dec | 34.3 °C | 28 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 18 |
| 18 Dec | 32.7 °C | 28 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 18 |
| 19 Dec | 34.3 °C | 25 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 20 Dec | 34.5 °C | 20 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 23 |
| 21 Dec | 34.7 °C | 22 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 22 Dec | 36.0 °C | 30 % | 19 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 23 Dec after | 36.3 °C | 31 % | 20 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 24 Dec after | 35.3 °C | 37 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 25 Dec after | 34.8 °C | 42 % | 21 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 22 |
| 26 Dec after | 34.9 °C | 40 % | 24 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 22 |
| 27 Dec after | 34.3 °C | 43 % | 24 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 22 |
| 28 Dec after | 35.4 °C | 38 % | 23 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 24 |
| 29 Dec after | 35.7 °C | 34 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 23 |
| 30 Dec after | 35.5 °C | 39 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 23 |
| 31 Dec after | 36.2 °C | 36 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 1 Jan after | 34.5 °C | 38 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
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 18 December 2025 the air beside the fire reached 43 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 36: 2.4 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 · 50Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 10,668 haSifiéDecember 2022 · 23 days · 12 km away
- 24,388 haGouiné15 January 2021 · 19 days · 13 km away
- 25,038 haGouinéDecember 2017 · 26 days · 15 km away
- 15,503 haGouiné1 January 2019 · 22 days · 15 km away
- 14,988 haGouiné29 January 2020 · 13 days · 16 km away
- 21,060 haGouiné6 January 2024 · 32 days · 20 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Guintéguéla fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 15 December 2025 and 22 December 2025: 8 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 3,344 hectares (33.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Guintéguéla (3,048 ha, 2.1 %); Gouiné (317 ha, 0.2 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 36.0 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 30 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 26, class High.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Côte d’Ivoire (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.
Emergency number: 180
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 (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.