How long did the Lodja fire last?

GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 5 July 2018 and 24 July 2018: 20 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 27,599 hectares (276.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 2 municipalities: Lodja (23,336 ha, 1.9 %); Kole (4,464 ha, 0.2 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 35.7 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 43 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.

CD · Congo - Kinshasa · 2018-07-05 → 2018-07-24

Lodja fire, 5 July 2018 Lodja, Kole

Out · last detection 25 Jul 2018, 23:39 UTC

The fire started on 5 July 2018 in Lodja, Congo - Kinshasa, and satellites saw it burning for 20 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 27,599 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 27th largest in Sankuru since 2016 (of 187 with a page). Number 4 in Congo - Kinshasa in 2018, of 128.

Burnt area: 27,599ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 20days; 5 Jul 2018 – 24 Jul 2018
Municipalities hit: 2; territories
Started on: 5 Jul; 2018
Heat detections: 1,436; in a single hotspot: 129 MW
Danger at start: 18; Moderate · FWI index
Energy released: 16.4GW; sum of detected power

Play back 25 Jul 2018

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 5 Jul24 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

5678910111213141516171819202122232425

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

The weather it burned in

36°high

43km/h · peak gust

18%lowest humidity

It had gone 3 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 2.1 mm on 31 Jul.

This area had burned before

84% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 24,360 ha in 2016, 1,942 ha in 2017. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 23,181 ha that had burned before.

18,051 ha Lodja fire, June 2016 30,512 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire

What happened to each town

Lodja where it started

23,336 ha reached on 29 Jun

1.9 %
Kole

4,464 ha reached on 2 Jul

0.2 %

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)
29 Jun	30.9 °C	45 %	25 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 18
30 Jun	30.5 °C	54 %	22 km/h	1.6 mm	Low 8
1 Jul	29.3 °C	61 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 11
2 Jul	31.2 °C	50 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 16
3 Jul	32.4 °C	45 %	29 km/h	0.2 mm	Moderate 19
4 Jul	30.9 °C	49 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 19
5 Jul	32.0 °C	34 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	High 25
6 Jul	32.6 °C	27 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	High 32
7 Jul	33.2 °C	26 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
8 Jul	33.4 °C	24 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
9 Jul	34.5 °C	22 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
10 Jul	34.5 °C	21 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
11 Jul	33.7 °C	27 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
12 Jul	33.3 °C	27 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
13 Jul	33.4 °C	27 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
14 Jul	33.3 °C	30 %	19 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
15 Jul	32.7 °C	32 %	23 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
16 Jul	32.9 °C	32 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
17 Jul	32.9 °C	26 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
18 Jul	32.9 °C	26 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
19 Jul	32.5 °C	26 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
20 Jul	34.1 °C	24 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
21 Jul	34.8 °C	22 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
22 Jul	34.5 °C	23 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
23 Jul	35.7 °C	20 %	42 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
24 Jul	34.7 °C	18 %	43 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 47
25 Jul after	34.5 °C	18 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
26 Jul after	30.7 °C	37 %	18 km/h	0.0 mm	High 32
27 Jul after	31.6 °C	43 %	24 km/h	1.7 mm	Moderate 14
28 Jul after	30.7 °C	46 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 20
29 Jul after	32.5 °C	40 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	High 25
30 Jul after	31.1 °C	45 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	High 25
31 Jul after	30.3 °C	54 %	27 km/h	2.1 mm	Low 10

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 28 Jun 2018

After · 31 Jul 2018

Before After

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 · 1,436Every 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 time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Congo - Kinshasa ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Lodja fire last?: GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 5 July 2018 and 24 July 2018: 20 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 27,599 hectares (276.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 2 municipalities: Lodja (23,336 ha, 1.9 %); Kole (4,464 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 35.7 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 43 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

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · Copernicus ↗

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?

Dates or duration Place or towns Burned area Name It was not a wildfire Same fire as another page Something else

What really happened?

Your connection to the fire (optional) Email (optional)

We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy.

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.

Where it burned