Skip to content
worldfires
UG · Uganda · →

Kibanda fire, 5 January 2018 Kibanda

Out · last detection 11 Jan 2018, 22:54 UTC

The fire started on 5 January 2018 in Kibanda, Uganda, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,703 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 20th largest in Western Region since 2016 (of 255 with a page). Number 2 in Uganda in 2018, of 82.

Burnt area
3,703ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
7days
5 Jan 2018 – 11 Jan 2018
Municipalities hit
1
counties
Started on
5 Jan
2018
Heat detections
104
in a single hotspot: 47 MW
Danger at start
34
High · FWI index
Energy released
710MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

11 Jan 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 5 Jan11 Jan

How it evolved, day by day

567891011

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

The weather it burned in

34°high
37km/h · peak gust
15%lowest humidity

It had gone 18 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

88% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 529 ha in 2016, 3,215 ha in 2017. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,258 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Kibanda where it started
    3,728 ha reached on 5 Jan
    1.0 %

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)
5 Jan 31.8 °C 24 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
6 Jan 31.8 °C 19 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
7 Jan 32.2 °C 19 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
8 Jan 32.1 °C 18 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
9 Jan 32.9 °C 15 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
10 Jan 33.3 °C 17 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
11 Jan 34.0 °C 21 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
12 Jan after 31.4 °C 31 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
13 Jan after 32.0 °C 29 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
14 Jan after 32.5 °C 27 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
15 Jan after 33.3 °C 20 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
16 Jan after 33.4 °C 19 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
17 Jan after 33.7 °C 20 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
18 Jan after 34.2 °C 15 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
19 Jan after 34.2 °C 16 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
20 Jan after 32.3 °C 21 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
21 Jan after 32.5 °C 30 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 34

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 29 Dec 2017
After · 18 Jan 2018

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 · 104Every 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 Uganda ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Kibanda fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 5 January 2018 and 11 January 2018: 7 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 3,703 hectares (37.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Kibanda (3,728 ha, 1.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 34.0 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 37 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 36, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Uganda (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.

Emergency number: 999 · 112

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
What do you think is wrong?

We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy. This is not an emergency service: if there is a fire now, call 999 · 112.

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.