How long did the Kamina fire last?

GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 7 August 2024 and 12 August 2024: 6 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 12,071 hectares (120.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 2 municipalities: Kamina (11,709 ha, 0.3 %); Bukama (427 ha, 0.0 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 35.9 °C, humidity dropped to 13 % and gusts hit 32 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 47, 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.

CD · Congo - Kinshasa · 2024-08-07 → 2024-08-12

Kamina fire, 7 August 2024 Kamina, Bukama

Out · last detection 12 Aug 2024, 11:59 UTC

The fire started on 7 August 2024 in Kamina, Congo - Kinshasa, and satellites saw it burning for 6 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 12,071 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 16th largest in Haut-Lomami since 2016 (of 172 with a page). Number 24 in Congo - Kinshasa in 2024, of 133.

Burnt area: 12,071ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 6days; 7 Aug 2024 – 12 Aug 2024
Municipalities hit: 2; territories
Started on: 7 Aug; 2024
Heat detections: 368; in a single hotspot: 303 MW
Danger at start: 45; Very high · FWI index
Energy released: 12.8GW; sum of detected power

Play back 12 Aug 2024

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 7 Aug12 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

789101112

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

The weather it burned in

36°high

32km/h · peak gust

13%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

73% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 4,734 ha in 2016, 838 ha in 2017, 1,998 ha in 2018, 4,581 ha in 2019, 1,596 ha in 2020, 1,573 ha in 2021, 816 ha in 2022, 4,948 ha in 2023. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 8,803 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

Kamina where it started

11,709 ha reached on 1 Aug

0.3 %
Bukama

427 ha reached on 12 Aug

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)
1 Aug	33.7 °C	20 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 45
2 Aug	33.3 °C	19 %	25 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
3 Aug	34.0 °C	19 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
4 Aug	35.2 °C	17 %	25 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
5 Aug	35.9 °C	15 %	25 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
6 Aug	35.5 °C	17 %	23 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
7 Aug	35.2 °C	13 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 47
8 Aug	35.2 °C	15 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
9 Aug	34.9 °C	17 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 45
10 Aug	34.7 °C	16 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 47
11 Aug	35.6 °C	15 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
12 Aug	35.7 °C	19 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
13 Aug after	34.8 °C	19 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
14 Aug after	35.7 °C	15 %	20 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
15 Aug after	31.6 °C	32 %	25 km/h	0.1 mm	High 36
16 Aug after	34.1 °C	20 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
17 Aug after	34.2 °C	19 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
18 Aug after	34.6 °C	19 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
19 Aug after	34.7 °C	17 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
20 Aug after	33.9 °C	16 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 45
21 Aug after	34.1 °C	17 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 47
22 Aug after	34.5 °C	16 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 45

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 31 Jul 2024

After · 19 Aug 2024

Before After

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 · Copernicus

On 6 August 2024 the air beside the fire reached 75 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 57: 3.8 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak75 µg/m³

Days over the guideline11 days

PM10108 µg/m³

Optical depth1.71

WHO 15

56789101112131415

Good Fair Moderate Poor Very poor Extremely poor

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 · 368Every 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 time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Congo - Kinshasa ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Kamina fire last?: GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 7 August 2024 and 12 August 2024: 6 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 12,071 hectares (120.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 2 municipalities: Kamina (11,709 ha, 0.3 %); Bukama (427 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 35.9 °C, humidity dropped to 13 % and gusts hit 32 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 47, 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

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · Copernicus ↗

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.

Where it burned