Manfran fire, January 2023 Manfran, Gbangbadou
The fire started on 28 January 2023 in Manfran, Guinea, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,129 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.
It is the 182th largest in Faranah since 2016 (of 208 with a page). Number 63 in Guinea in 2023, of 79.
- Burnt area
- 2,129ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 8days
- 28 Jan 2023 – 4 Feb 2023
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- sub-prefectures
- Started on
- 28 Jan
- 2023
- Heat detections
- 52
- in a single hotspot: 34 MW
- Energy released
- 554MW
- 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.
This area had burned before
88% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,165 ha in 2016, 858 ha in 2017, 378 ha in 2018, 58 ha in 2019, 547 ha in 2020, 964 ha in 2021. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 1,872 ha that had burned before.
- 531 ha Manfran fire, January 2017 70,029 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 258 ha Manfran fire, January 2018 2,589 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 126 ha Manfran fire, January 2020 19,542 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 58 ha Manfran fire, February 2019 2,141 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 10 ha Firawa fire, January 2016 25,026 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Manfran where it started2,138 ha reached on 28 Jan2.5 %
-
5 ha reached on 30 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.
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.
Detections table · 52Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 19,542 haManfran24 January 2020 · 16 days · 7 km away
- 25,026 haFirawaJanuary 2016 · 13 days · 8 km away
- 40,177 haManfranJanuary 2022 · 30 days · 15 km away
- 26,206 haManfran23 January 2021 · 9 days · 16 km away
- 70,029 haManfranJanuary 2017 · 16 days · 21 km away
- 26,689 haManfran5 February 2019 · 11 days · 23 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Manfran fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 28 January 2023 and 4 February 2023: 8 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 2,129 hectares (21.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Manfran (2,138 ha, 2.5 %); Gbangbadou (5 ha, 0.0 %).
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Guinea (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 ADM3 (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.