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Mariga fire, December 2020 Mariga, Kontagora

Out · last detection 16 Jan 2021, 12:54 UTC

The fire started on 23 December 2020 in Mariga, Nigeria, and satellites saw it burning for 24 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 26,828 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 5th largest in Niger since 2016 (of 271 with a page). The largest in Nigeria in 2020, of 150.

Burnt area
26,828ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
24days
23 Dec 2020 – 15 Jan 2021
Municipalities hit
2
local government areas
Started on
23 Dec
2020
Heat detections
1,715
in a single hotspot: 98 MW
Danger at start
39
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
13.9GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

16 Jan 2021
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 23 Dec15 Jan

How it evolved, day by day

23242526272829303112345678910111213141516

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

The weather it burned in

37°high
40km/h · peak gust
14%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

18% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 4,534 ha in 2016, 318 ha in 2020.

What happened to each town

  1. Mariga where it started
    15,375 ha reached on 23 Dec
    2.4 %
  2. Kontagora
    11,614 ha reached on 27 Dec
    6.3 %

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.

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 Dec 33.9 °C 20 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
24 Dec 34.1 °C 19 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
25 Dec 32.4 °C 20 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
26 Dec 32.2 °C 19 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
27 Dec 32.4 °C 20 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
28 Dec 32.3 °C 22 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
29 Dec 33.4 °C 21 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
30 Dec 33.8 °C 21 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
31 Dec 35.5 °C 17 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
1 Jan 35.2 °C 19 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
2 Jan 34.1 °C 23 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
3 Jan 36.0 °C 21 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
4 Jan 36.7 °C 20 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
5 Jan 36.7 °C 18 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
6 Jan 36.9 °C 15 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
7 Jan 37.0 °C 14 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
8 Jan 36.7 °C 17 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
9 Jan 36.4 °C 17 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
10 Jan 36.1 °C 17 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
11 Jan 35.5 °C 17 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
12 Jan 34.6 °C 18 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
13 Jan 34.8 °C 17 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
14 Jan 34.6 °C 16 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
15 Jan 34.0 °C 15 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
16 Jan after 33.6 °C 16 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
17 Jan after 34.7 °C 9 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
18 Jan after 34.2 °C 18 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
19 Jan after 33.5 °C 16 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
20 Jan after 32.7 °C 18 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
21 Jan after 32.0 °C 17 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
22 Jan after 32.7 °C 12 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
23 Jan after 32.5 °C 17 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
24 Jan after 34.4 °C 16 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
25 Jan after 35.0 °C 14 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 16 Dec 2020
After · 22 Jan 2021

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 · 1,715Every 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 Nigeria ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Mariga fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 23 December 2020 and 15 January 2021: 24 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 26,828 hectares (268.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Mariga (15,375 ha, 2.4 %); Kontagora (11,614 ha, 6.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 37.0 °C, humidity dropped to 14 % and gusts hit 40 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 Nigeria (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.

Emergency number: 112

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
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We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy. This is not an emergency service: if there is a fire now, call 112.

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 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)). 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.