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Luiza fire, 25 June 2017 Luiza

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

The fire started on 25 June 2017 in Luiza, Congo - Kinshasa, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 9,057 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 27th largest in Central Kasai since 2016 (of 84 with a page). Number 31 in Congo - Kinshasa in 2017, of 138.

Burnt area
9,057ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
5days
25 Jun 2017 – 29 Jun 2017
Municipalities hit
1
territories
Started on
25 Jun
2017
Heat detections
344
in a single hotspot: 114 MW
Danger at start
40
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
3.1GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

29 Jun 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 25 Jun29 Jun

How it evolved, day by day

2526272829

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

The weather it burned in

34°high
45km/h · peak gust
16%lowest humidity

It had gone 38 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

67% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 6,943 ha in 2016. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 6,097 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Luiza where it started
    9,124 ha reached on 25 Jun
    0.6 %

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)
25 Jun 33.1 °C 23 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
26 Jun 33.9 °C 17 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
27 Jun 33.2 °C 16 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
28 Jun 32.3 °C 18 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
29 Jun 30.9 °C 23 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
30 Jun after 32.1 °C 22 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
1 Jul after 33.0 °C 17 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
2 Jul after 32.3 °C 19 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
3 Jul after 33.5 °C 19 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
4 Jul after 32.5 °C 18 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
5 Jul after 31.6 °C 20 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
6 Jul after 31.9 °C 24 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
7 Jul after 28.1 °C 42 % 31 km/h 0.3 mm High 30
8 Jul after 33.0 °C 25 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
9 Jul after 32.6 °C 25 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
10 Jul after 33.4 °C 19 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
11 Jul after 31.4 °C 19 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
12 Jul after 28.5 °C 45 % 24 km/h 0.2 mm High 28
13 Jul after 32.0 °C 21 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
14 Jul after 31.5 °C 22 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
15 Jul after 32.8 °C 19 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
16 Jul after 32.1 °C 21 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 36

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 18 Jun 2017
After · 6 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 · 344Every 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 Luiza fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 25 June 2017 and 29 June 2017: 5 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 9,057 hectares (90.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Luiza (9,124 ha, 0.6 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 33.9 °C, humidity dropped to 16 % and gusts hit 45 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 48, 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.