Idiofa fire, July 2026 Idiofa
The fire started on 29 July 2026 in Idiofa, Congo - Kinshasa, and satellites saw it burning for 31 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 32,803 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 9th largest in Kwilu since 2016 (of 236 with a page). Number 37 in Congo - Kinshasa in 2026, of 523.
- Burnt area
- 32,803ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 31days
- 29 Jul 2026 – 28 Aug 2026
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- territories
- Started on
- 29 Jul
- 2026
- Heat detections
- 925
- in a single hotspot: 128 MW
- Danger at start
- 28
- High · FWI index
- Energy released
- 10.4GW
- 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 37 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.1 mm on 2 Sept.
This area had burned before
95% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 19,755 ha in 2016, 18,640 ha in 2017, 13,555 ha in 2018, 10,325 ha in 2019, 20,528 ha in 2020, 10,380 ha in 2021, 4,356 ha in 2022, 9,511 ha in 2023, 14,575 ha in 2024, 15,076 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 31,260 ha that had burned before.
- 7,212 ha Idiofa fire, July 2024 9,800 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 6,210 ha Idiofa fire, July 2018 7,160 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 5,986 ha Idiofa fire, July 2016 7,928 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 4,808 ha Idiofa fire, July 2020 15,602 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,948 ha Idiofa fire, July 2017 5,739 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,089 ha Idiofa fire, August 2018 7,760 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,883 ha Idiofa fire, July 2016 6,066 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,823 ha Idiofa fire, July 2016 6,407 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Idiofa where it started33,031 ha reached on 29 Jul1.7 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 29 Jul | 32.3 °C | 42 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 30 Jul | 31.0 °C | 51 % | 30 km/h | 2.1 mm | Low 10 |
| 31 Jul | 30.5 °C | 55 % | 22 km/h | 0.7 mm | Moderate 12 |
| 1 Aug | 33.1 °C | 37 % | 20 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 2 Aug | 32.9 °C | 40 % | 22 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 24 |
| 3 Aug | 33.7 °C | 35 % | 20 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 4 Aug | 32.9 °C | 44 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 5 Aug | 34.7 °C | 30 % | 19 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 6 Aug | 33.2 °C | 36 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 7 Aug | 30.9 °C | 52 % | 30 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 26 |
| 8 Aug | 33.6 °C | 40 % | 22 km/h | 0.3 mm | High 24 |
| 9 Aug | 33.1 °C | 44 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 10 Aug | 33.6 °C | 43 % | 26 km/h | 0.2 mm | High 25 |
| 11 Aug | 31.7 °C | 50 % | 26 km/h | 0.3 mm | High 24 |
| 12 Aug | 34.7 °C | 36 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 13 Aug | 35.3 °C | 38 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 14 Aug | 33.8 °C | 42 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 15 Aug | 34.0 °C | 35 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 16 Aug | 34.4 °C | 32 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 17 Aug | 35.2 °C | 28 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 18 Aug | 34.5 °C | 30 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 19 Aug | 34.9 °C | 29 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 20 Aug | 33.8 °C | 37 % | 34 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 35 |
| 21 Aug | 34.2 °C | 34 % | 21 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 22 Aug | 34.5 °C | 41 % | 29 km/h | 0.2 mm | High 32 |
| 23 Aug | 34.2 °C | 46 % | 26 km/h | 0.8 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 24 Aug | 34.8 °C | 34 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 25 Aug | 35.1 °C | 39 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 26 Aug | 32.8 °C | 47 % | 27 km/h | 0.3 mm | High 27 |
| 27 Aug | 38.2 °C | 28 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 35 |
| 28 Aug | 34.6 °C | 46 % | 33 km/h | 10.2 mm | Low 6 |
| 29 Aug after | 30.8 °C | 56 % | 28 km/h | 0.5 mm | Moderate 12 |
| 30 Aug after | 33.7 °C | 44 % | 22 km/h | 0.3 mm | Moderate 19 |
| 31 Aug after | 33.6 °C | 45 % | 28 km/h | 0.4 mm | High 22 |
| 1 Sept after | 36.5 °C | 35 % | 22 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 26 |
| 2 Sept after | 34.7 °C | 46 % | 24 km/h | 1.1 mm | Moderate 19 |
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 19 August 2026 the air beside the fire reached 773 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 430: 29 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 · 925Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 9,800 haIdiofa28 July 2024 · 19 days · 1 km away
- 15,602 haIdiofa19 July 2020 · 25 days · 10 km away
- 21,063 haIdiofa17 July 2016 · 21 days · 21 km away
- 22,627 haIdiofa11 August 2026 · 22 days · 23 km away
- 12,726 haIdiofa18 July 2020 · 26 days · 29 km away
- 8,715 haIdiofa17 August 2026 · 12 days · 32 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Idiofa fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 29 July 2026 to 28 August 2026 (31 days). The perimeter dates it from 29 July 2026 to 25 August 2026.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 32,803 hectares (328.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Idiofa (33,031 ha, 1.7 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 38.2 °C, humidity dropped to 28 % and gusts hit 34 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 35, class 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.
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 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.