How long did the Kamina fire last?

According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 6 August 2026 to 10 September 2026 (36 days). The perimeter dates it from 11 August 2026 to 5 September 2026.

How much area did it burn?

The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 24,564 hectares (245.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire only entered Kamina (24,796 ha, 0.6 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 36.1 °C, humidity dropped to 12 % and gusts hit 37 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 48, class Very high.

Where does this data come from?

From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Democratic Republic of the Congo (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

CD · Democratic Republic of the Congo · 2026-08-06 → 2026-09-10

Kamina fire, 6 August 2026 Kamina

Out · last detection 10 Sept 2026, 11:38 UTC

The fire started on 6 August 2026 in Kamina, Democratic Republic of the Congo, and satellites saw it burning for 36 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 24,564 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the largest fire in Haut-Lomami since 2016 (of 172 with a page). Number 51 in Democratic Republic of the Congo in 2026, of 523.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Kamina · 2026 Kamina · 2026 Kamina · 2026 Kamina · 2023

Burnt area: 24,564ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 36days; 6 Aug 2026 – 10 Sept 2026
Municipalities hit: 1; territories
Started on: 6 Aug; 2026
Heat detections: 686; in a single hotspot: 92 MW
Danger at start: 42; Very high · FWI index
Average daily power: 235MW; detected power per day, on average

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 6 Aug10 Sept

Play back 10 Sept 2026

How it evolved, day by day

6 Aug 12 Aug 17 Aug 22 Aug 28 Aug 2 Sept 10 Sept

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

37km/h · peak gust

12%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

55% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,669 ha in 2016, 3,923 ha in 2017, 912 ha in 2018, 2,639 ha in 2019, 38 ha in 2020, 30 ha in 2021, 3,081 ha in 2022, 2,242 ha in 2023, 1,603 ha in 2024, 3,805 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 13,621 ha that had burned before.

How big is it?

It burned the equivalent of 16% of the area of London (246 km² against 1,583 km²).

London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).

This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.

What happened to each town

Kamina where it started

24,796 ha reached on 6 Aug

0.6 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.

People and buildings inside the perimeter

GHSL 2025

Built-up area< 0.1 ha

Residents< 20

Inside the perimeter there was no noticeable built-up land and almost nobody lived there (GHSL 2025, satellite-based estimate).

This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned. The GHSL 2025 epoch is a projection made from 2020 and earlier data.

Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu

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)
6 Aug	32.8 °C	17 %	19 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
7 Aug	33.5 °C	19 %	20 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
8 Aug	33.6 °C	21 %	21 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
9 Aug	33.4 °C	28 %	23 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
10 Aug	32.4 °C	25 %	19 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
11 Aug	32.2 °C	27 %	19 km/h	0.0 mm	High 38
12 Aug	32.9 °C	22 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	High 38
13 Aug	33.8 °C	17 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
14 Aug	33.0 °C	21 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
15 Aug	32.0 °C	18 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
16 Aug	31.8 °C	15 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
17 Aug	32.7 °C	13 %	25 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
18 Aug	33.3 °C	12 %	25 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 47
19 Aug	33.2 °C	13 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 47
20 Aug	32.9 °C	12 %	22 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
21 Aug	32.8 °C	16 %	22 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 47
22 Aug	33.9 °C	19 %	23 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
23 Aug	34.2 °C	17 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 48
24 Aug	34.5 °C	18 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
25 Aug	34.9 °C	21 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 47
26 Aug	33.6 °C	24 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 41
27 Aug	35.1 °C	22 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
28 Aug	32.6 °C	26 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
29 Aug	34.1 °C	20 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
30 Aug	34.7 °C	16 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
31 Aug	35.7 °C	16 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 45
1 Sept	36.1 °C	16 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
2 Sept	34.4 °C	21 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
3 Sept	34.4 °C	22 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
4 Sept	33.2 °C	39 %	35 km/h	2.1 mm	Moderate 17
5 Sept	28.6 °C	46 %	31 km/h	1.1 mm	Moderate 16
6 Sept	35.7 °C	20 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
7 Sept	34.5 °C	23 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	High 38
8 Sept	35.8 °C	18 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 45
9 Sept	34.0 °C	21 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
10 Sept	34.1 °C	21 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
11 Sept after	34.6 °C	21 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
12 Sept after	34.4 °C	23 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 41
13 Sept after	35.2 °C	23 %	23 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38
14 Sept after	34.5 °C	27 %	26 km/h	0.2 mm	Very high 38
15 Sept after	35.0 °C	23 %	25 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
16 Sept after	36.7 °C	15 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 45
17 Sept after	34.7 °C	19 %	23 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
18 Sept after	35.3 °C	19 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
19 Sept after	34.0 °C	27 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
20 Sept after	32.5 °C	39 %	26 km/h	0.5 mm	High 34

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 30 Jul 2026

After · 17 Sept 2026

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 20 August 2026 the air beside the fire reached 219 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 129: 8.6 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak219 µg/m³

Days over the guideline41 days

PM10223 µg/m³

Optical depth2.15

WHO 15

4567891011121314151617181920212223242526272829303112345678910111213

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 · 686Every 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 Democratic Republic of the Congo ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Kamina fire last?: According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 6 August 2026 to 10 September 2026 (36 days). The perimeter dates it from 11 August 2026 to 5 September 2026.
How much area did it burn?: The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 24,564 hectares (245.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire only entered Kamina (24,796 ha, 0.6 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 36.1 °C, humidity dropped to 12 % and gusts hit 37 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 48, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?: From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Democratic Republic of the Congo (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 ↗

History of this page Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.

No changes since 24 October 2026.

RSS Changes to this page

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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What do you think is wrong?

Dates or duration Place or towns Burned area Name It was not a wildfire Same fire as another page Something else

What really happened?

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How we know this

Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery; 3 polygons grouped in this page.
Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 11 August 2026 to 5 September 2026. 686 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
We have not matched this page with any official record.
Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2025, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.

How we build fire pages: methodology ›

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