Lainya fire, 7 January 2026 Lainya, Juba, Yei
The fire started on 7 January 2026 in Lainya, South Sudan, and satellites saw it burning for 19 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 38,618 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.
It is the largest fire in Central Equatoria since 2016 (of 84 with a page). Number 6 in South Sudan in 2026, of 182.
- Burnt area
- 38,618ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 19days
- 7 Jan 2026 – 25 Jan 2026
- Municipalities hit
- 3
- counties
- Started on
- 7 Jan
- 2026
- Heat detections
- 1,471
- in a single hotspot: 147 MW
- Danger at start
- 30
- High · FWI index
- Energy released
- 10.6GW
- 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.
The weather it burned in
It had gone 41 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.0 mm on 7 Feb.
This area had burned before
93% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 19,685 ha in 2016, 12,275 ha in 2017, 11,594 ha in 2018, 5,310 ha in 2019, 6,013 ha in 2020, 16,632 ha in 2021, 7,958 ha in 2022, 14,568 ha in 2023, 8,087 ha in 2024, 1,455 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 35,979 ha that had burned before.
- 10,375 ha Lainya fire, January 2016 20,594 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 5,922 ha Lainya fire, January 2017 8,671 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 5,419 ha Lainya fire, January 2023 8,836 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 5,081 ha Lainya fire, January 2021 6,732 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 344 ha Lainya fire, February 2022 5,438 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Lainya where it started37,970 ha reached on 1 Jan11 %
-
726 ha reached on 1 Jan0.0 %
-
196 ha reached on 7 Jan0.0 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 Jan | 33.0 °C | 25 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 2 Jan | 32.6 °C | 37 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 3 Jan | 33.9 °C | 27 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 4 Jan | 34.4 °C | 23 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 5 Jan | 33.9 °C | 22 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 6 Jan | 34.7 °C | 22 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 7 Jan | 35.3 °C | 18 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 8 Jan | 34.8 °C | 19 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 9 Jan | 34.3 °C | 21 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 10 Jan | 34.0 °C | 21 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 11 Jan | 33.4 °C | 24 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 12 Jan | 34.0 °C | 24 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 13 Jan | 34.7 °C | 22 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 14 Jan | 34.1 °C | 22 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 15 Jan | 33.8 °C | 21 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 16 Jan | 32.9 °C | 24 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 17 Jan | 33.6 °C | 20 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 18 Jan | 34.7 °C | 19 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 19 Jan | 34.9 °C | 22 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 20 Jan | 35.4 °C | 27 % | 37 km/h | 0.1 mm | Very high 43 |
| 21 Jan | 35.4 °C | 23 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 22 Jan | 36.3 °C | 18 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 23 Jan | 36.4 °C | 17 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 24 Jan | 36.8 °C | 19 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 25 Jan | 36.8 °C | 17 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 26 Jan after | 35.8 °C | 17 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 27 Jan after | 34.8 °C | 19 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 28 Jan after | 33.4 °C | 25 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 29 Jan after | 33.9 °C | 28 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 30 Jan after | 35.1 °C | 22 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 31 Jan after | 35.4 °C | 19 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 1 Feb after | 31.9 °C | 25 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 2 Feb after | 34.3 °C | 27 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 38 |
| 3 Feb after | 35.6 °C | 23 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 4 Feb after | 36.1 °C | 22 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 5 Feb after | 34.8 °C | 26 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 6 Feb after | 34.9 °C | 27 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 7 Feb after | 32.6 °C | 35 % | 25 km/h | 1.0 mm | High 27 |
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.
The smoke
CAMS · CopernicusOn 6 January 2026 the air beside the fire reached 94 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 54: 3.6 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
Particles from the Copernicus CAMS model at the centre of the perimeter; these are not measurements in each town. The pale bar is the worst hour, the solid one the daily average.
Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS)
Detections table · 1,471Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Lainya fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 7 January 2026 and 25 January 2026: 19 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 38,618 hectares (386.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 3 municipalities: Lainya (37,970 ha, 11 %); Juba (726 ha, 0.0 %); Yei (196 ha, 0.0 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 36.8 °C, humidity dropped to 17 % and gusts hit 45 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 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.
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 (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.