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Hamer fire, August 2018 Hamer, Gnangatom

Out · last detection 15 Aug 2018, 23:43 UTC

The fire started on 11 August 2018 in Hamer, Ethiopia, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,094 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 71th largest in SNNPR since 2016 (of 186 with a page). Number 41 in Ethiopia in 2018, of 96.

Burnt area
3,094ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
5days
11 Aug 2018 – 15 Aug 2018
Municipalities hit
2
districts
Started on
11 Aug
2018
Heat detections
88
in a single hotspot: 129 MW
Danger at start
60
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
1.3GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

15 Aug 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 11 Aug15 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

1112131415

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
50km/h · peak gust
20%lowest humidity

It had gone 47 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

14% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 419 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Hamer where it started
    3,086 ha reached on 10 Aug
    0.5 %
  2. Gnangatom
    28 ha
    0.0 %

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)
11 Aug 35.7 °C 27 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
12 Aug 36.4 °C 25 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
13 Aug 35.4 °C 20 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
14 Aug 36.7 °C 24 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
15 Aug 35.5 °C 27 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
16 Aug after 36.4 °C 23 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
17 Aug after 34.6 °C 31 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
18 Aug after 34.0 °C 33 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
19 Aug after 34.4 °C 33 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
20 Aug after 35.8 °C 26 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
21 Aug after 33.2 °C 33 % 38 km/h 0.8 mm High 35
22 Aug after 33.8 °C 33 % 20 km/h 0.1 mm High 29
23 Aug after 36.3 °C 29 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
24 Aug after 34.5 °C 29 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
25 Aug after 35.0 °C 27 % 28 km/h 0.3 mm High 34

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 4 Aug 2018
After · 22 Aug 2018

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 · 88Every 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 Hamer fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 11 August 2018 and 15 August 2018: 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 3,094 hectares (30.9 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Hamer (3,086 ha, 0.5 %); Gnangatom (28 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 36.7 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 50 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 60, 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.

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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 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.