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Kasongo-Lunda fire, 4 July 2019 Kasongo-Lunda, Feshi

Out · last detection 9 Jul 2019, 11:53 UTC

The fire started on 4 July 2019 in Kasongo-Lunda, Congo - Kinshasa, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 10,517 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 43th largest in Kwango since 2016 (of 219 with a page). Number 18 in Congo - Kinshasa in 2019, of 115.

Burnt area
10,517ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
5days
4 Jul 2019 – 8 Jul 2019
Municipalities hit
2
territories
Started on
4 Jul
2019
Heat detections
377
in a single hotspot: 176 MW
Danger at start
26
High · FWI index
Energy released
7.0GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

9 Jul 2019
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 4 Jul8 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

456789

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
32km/h · peak gust
19%lowest humidity

It had gone 29 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

82% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 5,653 ha in 2016, 4,541 ha in 2017, 2,791 ha in 2018. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 8,636 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Kasongo-Lunda where it started
    7,778 ha reached on 30 Jun
    0.3 %
  2. Feshi
    2,807 ha reached on 6 Jul
    0.2 %

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)
30 Jun 29.0 °C 41 % 25 km/h 0.1 mm High 26
1 Jul 30.7 °C 25 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
2 Jul 30.7 °C 20 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
3 Jul 30.1 °C 29 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
4 Jul 31.6 °C 20 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
5 Jul 29.9 °C 22 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
6 Jul 30.5 °C 20 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
7 Jul 30.7 °C 21 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
8 Jul 29.7 °C 19 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
9 Jul after 28.1 °C 34 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
10 Jul after 28.5 °C 32 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
11 Jul after 29.2 °C 33 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
12 Jul after 28.5 °C 29 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
13 Jul after 26.2 °C 46 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
14 Jul after 30.0 °C 36 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
15 Jul after 31.2 °C 29 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
16 Jul after 29.6 °C 32 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
17 Jul after 29.2 °C 33 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
18 Jul after 31.2 °C 21 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
19 Jul after 29.7 °C 22 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
20 Jul after 29.0 °C 31 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm High 33

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 27 Jun 2019
After · 15 Jul 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 · 377Every 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 Kasongo-Lunda fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 4 July 2019 and 8 July 2019: 5 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 10,517 hectares (105.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Kasongo-Lunda (7,778 ha, 0.3 %); Feshi (2,807 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 31.6 °C, humidity dropped to 19 % and gusts hit 32 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 39, 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.