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Kakony fire, 18 April 2017 Kakony

Out · last detection 28 Apr 2017, 14:17 UTC

The fire started on 18 April 2017 in Kakony, Guinea, and satellites saw it burning for 11 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,191 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 64th largest in Boké since 2016 (of 237 with a page). Number 62 in Guinea in 2017, of 172.

Burnt area
3,191ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
11days
18 Apr 2017 – 28 Apr 2017
Municipalities hit
1
sub-prefectures
Started on
18 Apr
2017
Heat detections
119
in a single hotspot: 231 MW
Danger at start
49
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
2.7GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

28 Apr 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 18 Apr28 Apr

How it evolved, day by day

202122232425262728

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

The weather it burned in

41°high
36km/h · peak gust
20%lowest humidity

It had gone 18 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 6.2 mm on 7 May.

This area had burned before

34% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,084 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Kakony where it started
    3,211 ha reached on 15 Apr
    2.0 %

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)
18 Apr 40.9 °C 20 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
19 Apr 40.3 °C 20 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
20 Apr 38.2 °C 26 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
21 Apr 38.3 °C 24 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
22 Apr 38.8 °C 28 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
23 Apr 38.5 °C 26 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
24 Apr 38.6 °C 25 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
25 Apr 38.8 °C 22 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
26 Apr 39.8 °C 22 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
27 Apr 39.4 °C 26 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
28 Apr 38.3 °C 31 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
29 Apr after 37.8 °C 28 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
30 Apr after 39.0 °C 26 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
1 May after 39.3 °C 28 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
2 May after 37.5 °C 39 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
3 May after 38.8 °C 29 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
4 May after 37.2 °C 29 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
5 May after 38.7 °C 28 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
6 May after 40.9 °C 27 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
7 May after 39.2 °C 40 % 34 km/h 6.2 mm Moderate 14

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 11 Apr 2017
After · 5 May 2017

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 · 119Every 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 Guinea ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Kakony fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 18 April 2017 and 28 April 2017: 11 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 3,191 hectares (31.9 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Kakony (3,211 ha, 2.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 40.9 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 36 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 50, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Guinea (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 (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.