How long did the Luiza fire last?

GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 8 July 2017 and 21 July 2017: 14 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 13,785 hectares (137.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire only entered Luiza (13,890 ha, 0.9 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 33.5 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 41 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 46, 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 · 2017-07-08 → 2017-07-21

Luiza fire, 8 July 2017 Luiza

Out · last detection 22 Jul 2017, 23:40 UTC

The fire started on 8 July 2017 in Luiza, Congo - Kinshasa, and satellites saw it burning for 14 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 13,785 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 10th largest in Central Kasai since 2016 (of 84 with a page). Number 9 in Congo - Kinshasa in 2017, of 138.

Burnt area: 13,785ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 14days; 8 Jul 2017 – 21 Jul 2017
Municipalities hit: 1; territories
Started on: 8 Jul; 2017
Heat detections: 529; in a single hotspot: 237 MW
Danger at start: 45; Very high · FWI index
Energy released: 7.3GW; sum of detected power

Play back 22 Jul 2017

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 8 Jul21 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

8910111213141516171819202122

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

41km/h · peak gust

15%lowest humidity

It had gone 44 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

60% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 8,494 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

Luiza where it started

13,890 ha reached on 1 Jul

0.9 %

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)
1 Jul	32.0 °C	18 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 45
2 Jul	31.4 °C	20 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 45
3 Jul	33.5 °C	18 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 41
4 Jul	31.6 °C	20 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
5 Jul	30.6 °C	23 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
6 Jul	30.7 °C	26 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
7 Jul	28.1 °C	38 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	High 33
8 Jul	32.4 °C	26 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
9 Jul	32.0 °C	25 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
10 Jul	33.0 °C	18 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
11 Jul	30.6 °C	20 %	25 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
12 Jul	29.8 °C	32 %	23 km/h	0.1 mm	High 35
13 Jul	31.5 °C	19 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	High 38
14 Jul	31.2 °C	21 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
15 Jul	32.3 °C	19 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
16 Jul	31.8 °C	20 %	23 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
17 Jul	33.4 °C	15 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
18 Jul	32.1 °C	16 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
19 Jul	32.2 °C	21 %	20 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
20 Jul	33.4 °C	18 %	16 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
21 Jul	32.2 °C	19 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
22 Jul after	32.5 °C	22 %	20 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
23 Jul after	31.2 °C	30 %	22 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38
24 Jul after	31.5 °C	28 %	27 km/h	0.5 mm	High 36
25 Jul after	30.0 °C	33 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
26 Jul after	28.0 °C	45 %	22 km/h	0.3 mm	High 27
27 Jul after	28.8 °C	42 %	21 km/h	0.0 mm	High 27
28 Jul after	32.0 °C	22 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38
29 Jul after	30.8 °C	22 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
30 Jul after	31.3 °C	22 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
31 Jul after	32.7 °C	21 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
1 Aug after	31.4 °C	26 %	22 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
2 Aug after	29.4 °C	36 %	19 km/h	0.0 mm	High 29
3 Aug after	31.7 °C	23 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
4 Aug after	31.5 °C	24 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
5 Aug after	32.4 °C	20 %	25 km/h	0.0 mm	High 38
6 Aug after	27.8 °C	41 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	High 30
7 Aug after	30.9 °C	30 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	High 29

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 1 Jul 2017

After · 28 Jul 2017

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 · 529Every 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 Luiza fire last?: GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 8 July 2017 and 21 July 2017: 14 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 13,785 hectares (137.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire only entered Luiza (13,890 ha, 0.9 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 33.5 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 41 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 46, 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.

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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.

Where it burned