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Malentouen fire, February 2017 Malentouen, Ngambé-Tikar

Out · last detection 5 Mar 2017, 12:46 UTC

The fire started on 23 February 2017 in Malentouen, Cameroon, and satellites saw it burning for 11 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,058 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 5th largest in West since 2016 (of 35 with a page). Number 10 in Cameroon in 2017, of 294.

Burnt area
4,058ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
11days
23 Feb 2017 – 5 Mar 2017
Municipalities hit
2
communes
Started on
23 Feb
2017
Heat detections
224
in a single hotspot: 76 MW
Danger at start
51
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
1.8GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

5 Mar 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 23 Feb5 Mar

How it evolved, day by day

23242526272812345

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

The weather it burned in

38°high
36km/h · peak gust
9%lowest humidity

It had gone 28 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

47% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,921 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Malentouen where it started
    4,032 ha reached on 16 Feb
    3.7 %
  2. Ngambé-Tikar
    52 ha reached on 26 Feb
    0.0 %

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)
23 Feb 38.1 °C 11 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
24 Feb 37.8 °C 9 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
25 Feb 36.9 °C 15 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
26 Feb 33.4 °C 30 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
27 Feb 37.0 °C 17 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
28 Feb 37.4 °C 12 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
1 Mar 36.9 °C 16 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
2 Mar 36.4 °C 22 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
3 Mar 37.4 °C 15 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
4 Mar 38.1 °C 14 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
5 Mar 37.4 °C 22 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
6 Mar after 37.5 °C 20 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
7 Mar after 37.2 °C 27 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
8 Mar after 37.6 °C 14 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
9 Mar after 37.8 °C 21 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
10 Mar after 35.8 °C 23 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
11 Mar after 36.4 °C 20 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
12 Mar after 34.8 °C 21 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
13 Mar after 35.6 °C 32 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
14 Mar after 36.3 °C 26 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
15 Mar after 37.8 °C 15 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 16 Feb 2017
After · 12 Mar 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 · 224Every 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 Cameroon ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Malentouen fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 23 February 2017 and 5 March 2017: 11 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 4,058 hectares (40.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Malentouen (4,032 ha, 3.7 %); Ngambé-Tikar (52 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 38.1 °C, humidity dropped to 9 % and gusts hit 36 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 53, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Cameroon (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 (Open Data Commons Open Database License 1.0). 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.