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Marte fire, 8 October 2023 Marte

Out · last detection 9 Oct 2023, 11:40 UTC

The fire started on 8 October 2023 in Marte, Nigeria, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,806 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 224th largest in Borno since 2016 (of 457 with a page). Number 72 in Nigeria in 2023, of 161.

Burnt area
2,806ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
2days
8 Oct 2023 – 9 Oct 2023
Municipalities hit
1
local government areas
Started on
8 Oct
2023
Heat detections
66
in a single hotspot: 127 MW
Danger at start
29
High · FWI index
Energy released
1.3GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

9 Oct 2023
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 8 Oct9 Oct

How it evolved, day by day

89

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

The weather it burned in

39°high
37km/h · peak gust
22%lowest humidity

It had gone 2 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

83% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 990 ha in 2016, 182 ha in 2017, 208 ha in 2018, 1,481 ha in 2021. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,343 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Marte where it started
    2,824 ha reached on 8 Oct
    1.3 %

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)
8 Oct 37.2 °C 25 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
9 Oct 38.9 °C 22 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
10 Oct after 39.5 °C 19 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
11 Oct after 39.4 °C 24 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
12 Oct after 34.1 °C 41 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
13 Oct after 38.7 °C 29 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
14 Oct after 39.1 °C 20 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
15 Oct after 37.9 °C 25 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
16 Oct after 36.3 °C 38 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
17 Oct after 39.4 °C 21 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
18 Oct after 39.6 °C 14 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
19 Oct after 38.6 °C 20 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 1 Oct 2023
After · 16 Oct 2023

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 · 66Every 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 Marte fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 8 October 2023 and 9 October 2023: 2 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 2,806 hectares (28.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Marte (2,824 ha, 1.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 38.9 °C, humidity dropped to 22 % and gusts hit 37 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 32, class High.
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
What do you think is wrong?

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.