Manfran fire, February 2023 Manfran, Firawa
The fire started on 18 February 2023 in Manfran, Guinea, and satellites saw it burning for 4 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,246 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.
It is the 155th largest in Faranah since 2016 (of 208 with a page). Number 51 in Guinea in 2023, of 79.
- Burnt area
- 2,246ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 4days
- 18 Feb 2023 – 21 Feb 2023
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- sub-prefectures
- Started on
- 18 Feb
- 2023
- Heat detections
- 65
- in a single hotspot: 77 MW
- Energy released
- 704MW
- 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
97% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,533 ha in 2016, 1,625 ha in 2017, 201 ha in 2018, 670 ha in 2019, 1,319 ha in 2020, 695 ha in 2021, 132 ha in 2022. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,172 ha that had burned before.
- 1,625 ha Manfran fire, January 2017 70,029 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,533 ha Firawa fire, January 2016 25,026 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 879 ha Firawa fire, January 2020 11,561 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 670 ha Manfran fire, February 2019 26,689 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 349 ha Manfran fire, January 2021 2,771 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 201 ha Firawa fire, January 2018 6,245 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Manfran where it started1,775 ha reached on 17 Feb2.0 %
-
484 ha reached on 18 Feb1.3 %
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 · 65Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Manfran fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 18 February 2023 and 21 February 2023: 4 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 2,246 hectares (22.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Manfran (1,775 ha, 2.0 %); Firawa (484 ha, 1.3 %).
- 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.