Mayama fire, 19 July 2020 Mayama
The fire started on 19 July 2020 in Mayama, Republic of the Congo, and satellites saw it burning for 15 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,555 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 19th largest in Pool since 2016 (of 332 with a page). Number 5 in Republic of the Congo in 2020, of 75.
The power measured by the satellite is low (14.6 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.
Compare with…
Suggestions: Mayama · 2016Mayama · 2018Mayama · 2016Mayama · 2016
- Burnt area
- 3,555ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 15days
- 19 Jul 2020 – 2 Aug 2020
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- districts
- Started on
- 19 Jul
- 2020
- Heat detections
- 108
- in a single hotspot: 15 MW
- Danger at start
- 12
- Moderate · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 27MW
- 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 5 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
53% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,683 ha in 2016, 643 ha in 2018, 106 ha in 2019. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 1,872 ha that had burned before.
- 1,009 ha Mayama fire, July 2016 1,421 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 643 ha Mayama fire, August 2018 1,851 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 490 ha Mayama fire, June 2016 1,004 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 185 ha Mayama fire, May 2016 1,009 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 106 ha Mayama fire, June 2019 1,995 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
-
Mayama where it started3,578 ha reached on 19 Jul0.5 %
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.
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 19 Jul | 27.2 °C | 54 % | 20 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 12 |
| 20 Jul | 25.4 °C | 60 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 13 |
| 21 Jul | 27.4 °C | 56 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 14 |
| 22 Jul | 27.4 °C | 60 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 13 |
| 23 Jul | 25.5 °C | 61 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 14 |
| 24 Jul | 26.6 °C | 57 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 13 |
| 25 Jul | 27.3 °C | 56 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 15 |
| 26 Jul | 27.4 °C | 54 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 16 |
| 27 Jul | 24.8 °C | 63 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 15 |
| 28 Jul | 26.1 °C | 56 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 16 |
| 29 Jul | 26.3 °C | 58 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 16 |
| 30 Jul | 28.0 °C | 50 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 17 |
| 31 Jul | 26.6 °C | 58 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 17 |
| 1 Aug | 25.7 °C | 60 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 18 |
| 2 Aug | 25.7 °C | 62 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 16 |
| 3 Aug after | 26.1 °C | 62 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 17 |
| 4 Aug after | 25.2 °C | 63 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 17 |
| 5 Aug after | 24.7 °C | 63 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 16 |
| 6 Aug after | 27.0 °C | 53 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 18 |
| 7 Aug after | 27.1 °C | 58 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 18 |
| 8 Aug after | 29.3 °C | 47 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 20 |
| 9 Aug after | 26.2 °C | 58 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 10 Aug after | 28.4 °C | 49 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 20 |
| 11 Aug after | 27.3 °C | 58 % | 30 km/h | 0.7 mm | Moderate 15 |
| 12 Aug after | 27.6 °C | 60 % | 26 km/h | 0.1 mm | Moderate 14 |
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 · 108Every 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 Mayama fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 19 July 2020 to 2 August 2020 (15 days). The perimeter dates it from 19 July 2020 to 30 July 2020.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 3,555 hectares (35.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Mayama (3,578 ha, 0.5 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 28.0 °C, humidity dropped to 50 % and gusts hit 35 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 18, class Moderate.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Republic of the Congo (geoBoundaries ADM2). 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.
- Last day with fire: 30 July 2020 → 2 August 2020.
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; 2 polygons grouped in this page.
- Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 19 July 2020 to 30 July 2020. 108 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.
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 (Map Library 2007, nombres de Wikidata) (Public Domain). 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.