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Lainé fire, 9 January 2018 Gueasso, Lainé

Out · last detection 25 Jan 2018, 14:16 UTC

The fire started on 9 January 2018 in Lainé, Guinea, and satellites saw it burning for 16 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 5,394 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 16th largest in Nzérékoré since 2016 (of 241 with a page). Number 15 in Guinea in 2018, of 107.

Burnt area
5,394ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
16days
9 Jan 2018 – 24 Jan 2018
Municipalities hit
2
sub-prefectures
Started on
9 Jan
2018
Heat detections
297
in a single hotspot: 107 MW
Danger at start
33
High · FWI index
Energy released
3.0GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

25 Jan 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 9 Jan24 Jan

How it evolved, day by day

9101112131415161819202122232425

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
38km/h · peak gust
8%lowest humidity

It had gone 24 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 3.4 mm on 28 Jan.

This area had burned before

53% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 700 ha in 2016, 2,211 ha in 2017.

What happened to each town

  1. Gueasso
    3,323 ha reached on 6 Jan
    3.6 %
  2. Lainé where it started
    2,106 ha reached on 3 Jan
    4.9 %

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)
9 Jan 34.3 °C 22 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
10 Jan 34.4 °C 11 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
11 Jan 34.1 °C 9 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
12 Jan 34.1 °C 11 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
13 Jan 33.9 °C 8 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
14 Jan 34.1 °C 10 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
15 Jan 33.7 °C 24 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
16 Jan 33.8 °C 32 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
17 Jan 33.1 °C 39 % 26 km/h 0.1 mm High 28
18 Jan 35.0 °C 28 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
19 Jan 35.2 °C 13 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
20 Jan 34.6 °C 21 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
21 Jan 34.8 °C 12 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
22 Jan 34.5 °C 12 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
23 Jan 33.9 °C 15 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
24 Jan 34.1 °C 25 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
25 Jan after 34.6 °C 18 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
26 Jan after 33.1 °C 30 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
27 Jan after 34.1 °C 29 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
28 Jan after 32.8 °C 35 % 27 km/h 3.4 mm Low 10

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 2 Jan 2018
After · 31 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 · 297Every 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 Guinea ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Lainé fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 9 January 2018 and 24 January 2018: 16 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 5,394 hectares (53.9 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Gueasso (3,323 ha, 3.6 %); Lainé (2,106 ha, 4.9 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 35.2 °C, humidity dropped to 8 % and gusts hit 38 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 44, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Guinea (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 ADM3 (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.