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Kabongo fire, 24 July 2019 Kabongo, Kamina

Out · last detection 28 Jul 2019, 00:00 UTC

The fire started on 24 July 2019 in Kabongo, Congo - Kinshasa, and satellites saw it burning for 4 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 6,461 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 77th largest in Haut-Lomami since 2016 (of 172 with a page). Number 63 in Congo - Kinshasa in 2019, of 115.

Burnt area
6,461ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
4days
24 Jul 2019 – 27 Jul 2019
Municipalities hit
2
territories
Started on
24 Jul
2019
Heat detections
208
in a single hotspot: 269 MW
Danger at start
40
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
11.3GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

28 Jul 2019
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 24 Jul27 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

2425262728

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

The weather it burned in

32°high
37km/h · peak gust
16%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

52% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,496 ha in 2016, 56 ha in 2017, 2,295 ha in 2018. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,353 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Kabongo where it started
    5,027 ha reached on 21 Jul
    0.2 %
  2. Kamina
    1,478 ha reached on 24 Jul
    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)
24 Jul 31.3 °C 20 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
25 Jul 31.6 °C 20 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
26 Jul 31.8 °C 16 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
27 Jul 30.5 °C 18 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
28 Jul after 30.2 °C 21 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
29 Jul after 31.0 °C 23 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
30 Jul after 30.9 °C 22 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
31 Jul after 31.9 °C 20 % 17 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
1 Aug after 31.6 °C 27 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
2 Aug after 31.5 °C 19 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
3 Aug after 29.3 °C 39 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
4 Aug after 32.1 °C 33 % 34 km/h 0.1 mm High 32
5 Aug after 33.6 °C 27 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
6 Aug after 32.0 °C 34 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 34

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 17 Jul 2019
After · 3 Aug 2019

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 · 208Every 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 Kabongo fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 24 July 2019 and 27 July 2019: 4 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 6,461 hectares (64.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Kabongo (5,027 ha, 0.2 %); Kamina (1,478 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 31.8 °C, humidity dropped to 16 % 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.