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Kongolo fire, 17 June 2017 Kongolo

Out · last detection 29 Jun 2017, 11:27 UTC

The fire started on 17 June 2017 in Kongolo, Congo - Kinshasa, and satellites saw it burning for 12 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 10,707 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 33th largest in Tanganyika since 2016 (of 232 with a page). Number 21 in Congo - Kinshasa in 2017, of 138.

Burnt area
10,707ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
12days
17 Jun 2017 – 28 Jun 2017
Municipalities hit
1
territories
Started on
17 Jun
2017
Heat detections
307
in a single hotspot: 266 MW
Danger at start
46
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
7.6GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

29 Jun 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 17 Jun28 Jun

How it evolved, day by day

1719202122232426272829

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

The weather it burned in

35°high
46km/h · peak gust
20%lowest humidity

It had gone 34 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

38% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 4,326 ha in 2016. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 4,097 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Kongolo where it started
    10,782 ha reached on 11 Jun
    0.8 %

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)
11 Jun 35.0 °C 22 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
12 Jun 34.8 °C 24 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
13 Jun 34.2 °C 25 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
14 Jun 33.2 °C 31 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
15 Jun 33.6 °C 33 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
16 Jun 34.8 °C 23 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
17 Jun 35.0 °C 24 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
18 Jun 32.4 °C 37 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
19 Jun 34.7 °C 29 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
20 Jun 34.9 °C 24 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
21 Jun 34.4 °C 20 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
22 Jun 34.1 °C 23 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
23 Jun 34.6 °C 23 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
24 Jun 34.7 °C 25 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
25 Jun 34.8 °C 22 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
26 Jun 35.0 °C 21 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
27 Jun 34.3 °C 21 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
28 Jun 34.3 °C 21 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
29 Jun after 32.6 °C 30 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
30 Jun after 34.6 °C 20 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
1 Jul after 34.7 °C 19 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
2 Jul after 34.2 °C 21 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
3 Jul after 34.2 °C 21 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
4 Jul after 33.8 °C 22 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
5 Jul after 33.9 °C 26 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
6 Jul after 32.0 °C 31 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
7 Jul after 29.7 °C 36 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
8 Jul after 34.3 °C 26 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
9 Jul after 34.3 °C 25 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
10 Jul after 35.0 °C 14 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 10 Jun 2017
After · 5 Jul 2017

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 · 307Every 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 Kongolo fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 17 June 2017 and 28 June 2017: 12 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 10,707 hectares (107.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Kongolo (10,782 ha, 0.8 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 35.0 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 46 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 47, 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.