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Melit fire, November 2020 Melit

Out · last detection 30 Nov 2020, 10:55 UTC

The fire started on 28 November 2020 in Melit, Sudan, and satellites saw it burning for 3 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,873 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 62th largest in North Darfur since 2016 (of 140 with a page). Number 71 in Sudan in 2020, of 151.

Burnt area
2,873ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
3days
28 Nov 2020 – 30 Nov 2020
Municipalities hit
1
localities
Started on
28 Nov
2020
Heat detections
88
in a single hotspot: 69 MW
Danger at start
60
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
658MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

30 Nov 2020
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 28 Nov30 Nov

How it evolved, day by day

282930

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

The weather it burned in

29°high
42km/h · peak gust
8%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

15% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 442 ha in 2019.

What happened to each town

  1. Melit where it started
    2,885 ha reached on 28 Nov
    0.2 %

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)
28 Nov 28.6 °C 14 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
29 Nov 27.7 °C 10 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
30 Nov 28.0 °C 8 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
1 Dec after 29.3 °C 9 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
2 Dec after 29.1 °C 10 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
3 Dec after 29.2 °C 13 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
4 Dec after 30.1 °C 10 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
5 Dec after 30.3 °C 7 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 59
6 Dec after 30.4 °C 8 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 59
7 Dec after 31.7 °C 12 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 69
8 Dec after 31.8 °C 12 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 72
9 Dec after 32.1 °C 11 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 78
10 Dec after 32.3 °C 10 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 73

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 21 Nov 2020
After · 7 Dec 2020

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 · 88Every 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 Sudan ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Melit fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 28 November 2020 and 30 November 2020: 3 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 2,873 hectares (28.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Melit (2,885 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 28.6 °C, humidity dropped to 8 % and gusts hit 42 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 61, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Sudan (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.

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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 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.