Kérou fire, January 2022 Kérou
The fire started on 22 January 2022 in Kérou, Benin, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 1,166 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 436th largest in Atakora since 2016 (of 523 with a page). Number 77 in Benin in 2022, of 97.
The power measured by the satellite is low (9.6 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.
- Burnt area
- 1,166ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 8days
- 22 Jan 2022 – 29 Jan 2022
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- communes
- Started on
- 22 Jan
- 2022
- Heat detections
- 39
- in a single hotspot: 10 MW
- Energy released
- 108MW
- sum of detected power
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
This area had burned before
97% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 28 ha in 2016, 587 ha in 2017, 1,103 ha in 2019, 443 ha in 2020, 185 ha in 2021. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 1,130 ha that had burned before.
- 982 ha Kérou fire, December 2019 2,428 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 520 ha Kérou fire, November 2017 1,598 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 443 ha Kérou fire, December 2020 1,652 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 185 ha Kérou fire, November 2021 1,381 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 121 ha Kérou fire, November 2019 3,995 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 67 ha Kérou fire, November 2017 2,292 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 28 ha Kérou fire, November 2016 1,340 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Kérou where it started1,174 ha reached on 22 Jan0.3 %
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.
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
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 · 39Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 19,289 haKérou5 November 2025 · 33 days · 14 km away
- 13,497 haTanguiéta20 January 2019 · 8 days · 17 km away
- 79,640 haTanguiéta14 January 2021 · 31 days · 24 km away
- 49,721 haTanguiéta25 November 2019 · 35 days · 26 km away
- 76,460 haTanguiéta5 January 2022 · 48 days · 28 km away
- 57,261 haTanguiéta24 November 2024 · 28 days · 33 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Kérou fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 22 January 2022 to 29 January 2022 (8 days). The perimeter dates it from 22 January 2022 to 27 January 2022.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 1,166 hectares (11.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Kérou (1,174 ha, 0.3 %).
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Benin (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.
Report an error
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 (Public Domain). 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.