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Gungu fire, 23 July 2016 Gungu, Idiofa

Out · last detection 7 Aug 2016, 11:41 UTC

The fire started on 23 July 2016 in Gungu, Congo - Kinshasa, and satellites saw it burning for 16 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 10,931 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 63th largest in Kwilu since 2016 (of 236 with a page). Number 24 in Congo - Kinshasa in 2016, of 153.

Burnt area
10,931ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
16days
23 Jul 2016 – 7 Aug 2016
Municipalities hit
2
territories
Started on
23 Jul
2016
Heat detections
530
in a single hotspot: 130 MW
Danger at start
40
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
6.6GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

7 Aug 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 23 Jul7 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

2324252627282930311234567

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

The weather it burned in

35°high
37km/h · peak gust
15%lowest humidity

It had gone 19 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.4 mm on 14 Aug.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Gungu where it started
    7,060 ha reached on 19 Jul
    0.5 %
  2. Idiofa
    3,945 ha reached on 20 Jul
    0.2 %

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)
19 Jul 33.9 °C 19 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
20 Jul 33.4 °C 15 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
21 Jul 32.4 °C 20 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
22 Jul 33.2 °C 19 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
23 Jul 33.2 °C 28 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
24 Jul 30.9 °C 39 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
25 Jul 31.7 °C 37 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
26 Jul 31.7 °C 38 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
27 Jul 32.1 °C 36 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
28 Jul 31.9 °C 42 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
29 Jul 33.3 °C 38 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
30 Jul 31.3 °C 43 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
31 Jul 31.5 °C 42 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
1 Aug 35.2 °C 25 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
2 Aug 34.8 °C 24 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
3 Aug 34.6 °C 19 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
4 Aug 34.5 °C 24 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
5 Aug 34.3 °C 18 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
6 Aug 33.9 °C 16 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
7 Aug 34.6 °C 15 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
8 Aug after 28.8 °C 53 % 37 km/h 0.1 mm High 28
9 Aug after 32.4 °C 37 % 22 km/h 0.1 mm High 27
10 Aug after 32.4 °C 39 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
11 Aug after 31.3 °C 45 % 28 km/h 0.1 mm High 29
12 Aug after 32.9 °C 41 % 22 km/h 0.1 mm High 27
13 Aug after 33.7 °C 40 % 25 km/h 0.1 mm High 28
14 Aug after 32.4 °C 44 % 29 km/h 1.4 mm Moderate 18

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 16 Jul 2016
After · 14 Aug 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 · 530Every 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 Gungu fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 23 July 2016 and 7 August 2016: 16 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 10,931 hectares (109.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Gungu (7,060 ha, 0.5 %); Idiofa (3,945 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 35.2 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 37 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 44, 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.

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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.