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Koch fire, February 2016 Koch

Out · last detection 11 Feb 2016, 10:42 UTC

The fire started on 5 February 2016 in Koch, South Sudan, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 6,968 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 37th largest in Unity since 2016 (of 85 with a page). Number 137 in South Sudan in 2016, of 244.

Burnt area
6,968ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
7days
5 Feb 2016 – 11 Feb 2016
Municipalities hit
1
counties
Started on
5 Feb
2016
Heat detections
212
in a single hotspot: 125 MW
Danger at start
60
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
3.2GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

11 Feb 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 5 Feb11 Feb

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

40°high
42km/h · peak gust
6%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

  1. Koch where it started
    7,013 ha reached on 29 Jan
    1.6 %

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 Feb 40.1 °C 10 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
6 Feb 39.0 °C 9 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 63
7 Feb 37.6 °C 11 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 65
8 Feb 37.1 °C 9 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
9 Feb 37.4 °C 6 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
10 Feb 36.8 °C 7 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
11 Feb 36.8 °C 6 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 66
12 Feb after 37.5 °C 9 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 63
13 Feb after 38.6 °C 9 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 62
14 Feb after 39.9 °C 10 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 63
15 Feb after 40.9 °C 11 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 66
16 Feb after 41.2 °C 12 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 65
17 Feb after 40.9 °C 12 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
18 Feb after 41.6 °C 12 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 63
19 Feb after 42.1 °C 11 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 63
20 Feb after 41.6 °C 12 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 68
21 Feb after 42.1 °C 11 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 68

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 29 Jan 2016
After · 18 Feb 2016

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 · 212Every 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 South Sudan ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Koch fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 5 February 2016 and 11 February 2016: 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 6,968 hectares (69.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Koch (7,013 ha, 1.6 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 40.1 °C, humidity dropped to 6 % and gusts hit 42 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 66, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of South Sudan (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.