Massangam fire, 10 February 2026 Massangam, Deuk, Bangangté
The fire started on 10 February 2026 in Massangam, Cameroon, and satellites saw it burning for 27 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 38,532 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.
It is the largest fire in West since 2016 (of 35 with a page). Number 3 in Cameroon in 2026, of 386.
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- Burnt area
- 38,532ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 27days
- 10 Feb 2026 – 8 Mar 2026
- Municipalities hit
- 3
- communes
- Started on
- 10 Feb
- 2026
- Heat detections
- 1,881
- in a single hotspot: 149 MW
- Danger at start
- 37
- High · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 882MW
- detected power per day, on average
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.
The weather it burned in
It had gone 6 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 3.8 mm on 13 Mar.
This area had burned before
68% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,420 ha in 2019, 2,258 ha in 2020, 4,263 ha in 2021, 8,865 ha in 2022, 14,112 ha in 2023, 5,961 ha in 2024, 25,308 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 26,253 ha that had burned before.
- 16,114 ha Massangam fire, February 2025 17,970 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 6,186 ha Massangam fire, February 2023 6,781 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 4,324 ha Massangam fire, February 2025 4,260 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,386 ha Massangam fire, February 2023 3,457 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,294 ha Massangam fire, February 2022 2,413 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,031 ha Massangam fire, February 2022 3,614 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,796 ha Massangam fire, February 2023 2,219 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,750 ha Massangam fire, February 2021 3,372 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
Berlin boundary: geoBoundaries · Federal Agency for Cartography and Geodesy (dl-de/by-2-0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
Massangam where it started38,495 ha reached on 10 Feb17 %
-
284 ha reached on 4 Mar0.2 %
-
5 ha reached on 25 Feb0.0 %
Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.
People and buildings inside the perimeter
GHSL 2025Inside the perimeter there were about 1.7 hectares of built-up land and about 100 residents (GHSL 2025, satellite-based estimate).
This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned. The GHSL 2025 epoch is a projection made from 2020 and earlier data.
Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10 Feb | 32.8 °C | 28 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 11 Feb | 26.3 °C | 50 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 12 Feb | 30.9 °C | 34 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 13 Feb | 32.6 °C | 28 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 14 Feb | 31.5 °C | 32 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 15 Feb | 31.0 °C | 33 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 16 Feb | 33.7 °C | 26 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 38 |
| 17 Feb | 29.6 °C | 37 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 18 Feb | 30.7 °C | 31 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 19 Feb | 30.4 °C | 36 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 20 Feb | 31.6 °C | 30 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 21 Feb | 32.1 °C | 25 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 38 |
| 22 Feb | 32.8 °C | 23 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 23 Feb | 32.4 °C | 21 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 24 Feb | 32.0 °C | 28 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 25 Feb | 30.1 °C | 31 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 38 |
| 26 Feb | 29.9 °C | 24 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 38 |
| 27 Feb | 31.1 °C | 26 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 28 Feb | 31.3 °C | 25 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 1 Mar | 30.9 °C | 31 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 2 Mar | 31.0 °C | 33 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 35 |
| 3 Mar | 32.0 °C | 26 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 38 |
| 4 Mar | 30.8 °C | 29 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 5 Mar | 31.7 °C | 27 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 6 Mar | 31.6 °C | 31 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 7 Mar | 32.9 °C | 26 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 8 Mar | 32.6 °C | 32 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 9 Mar after | 33.9 °C | 21 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 10 Mar after | 32.0 °C | 28 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 11 Mar after | 32.5 °C | 31 % | 29 km/h | 0.1 mm | Very high 39 |
| 12 Mar after | 31.3 °C | 41 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 13 Mar after | 28.8 °C | 53 % | 37 km/h | 3.8 mm | Low 7 |
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.
The smoke
CAMS · CopernicusOn 25 February 2026 the air beside the fire reached 99 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 79: 5.2 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
Particles from the Copernicus CAMS model at the centre of the perimeter; these are not measurements in each town. The pale bar is the worst hour, the solid one the daily average.
Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS)
Detections table · 1,881Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 6,781 haMassangam7 February 2023 · 25 days · 3 km away
- 3,614 haMassangam18 February 2022 · 18 days · 3 km away
- 3,529 haMassangamFebruary 2020 · 22 days · 3 km away
- 3,457 haMassangam2 February 2023 · 29 days · 6 km away
- 17,970 haMassangam9 February 2025 · 30 days · 8 km away
- 4,260 haMassangam9 February 2025 · 36 days · 17 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Massangam fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 10 February 2026 to 8 March 2026 (27 days). The perimeter dates it from 17 February 2026 to 8 March 2026.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 38,532 hectares (385.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 3 municipalities: Massangam (38,495 ha, 17 %); Deuk (284 ha, 0.2 %); Bangangté (5 ha, 0.0 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 33.7 °C, humidity dropped to 21 % and gusts hit 38 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 43, class Very high.
- 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
History of this page · 1 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
- Start date: 17 February 2026 → 10 February 2026.
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
How we know this
- Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery; 3 polygons grouped in this page.
- Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 17 February 2026 to 8 March 2026. 1,881 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
- We have not matched this page with any official record.
- Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
- Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2025, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.
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.