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Ménaka fire, 8 October 2025 Ménaka

Out · last detection 10 Oct 2025, 01:50 UTC

The fire started on 8 October 2025 in Ménaka, Mali, and satellites saw it burning for 3 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,955 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 66th largest in Gao since 2016 (of 135 with a page). Number 137 in Mali in 2025, of 282.

Burnt area
2,955ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
3days
8 Oct 2025 – 10 Oct 2025
Municipalities hit
1
communes
Started on
8 Oct
2025
Heat detections
100
in a single hotspot: 77 MW
Danger at start
51
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
737MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

10 Oct 2025
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 8 Oct10 Oct

How it evolved, day by day

810

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

The weather it burned in

40°high
30km/h · peak gust
20%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

  1. Ménaka where it started
    2,968 ha reached on 8 Oct
    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)
8 Oct 39.5 °C 20 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
9 Oct 38.3 °C 25 % 28 km/h 0.8 mm Very high 43
10 Oct 39.9 °C 20 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
11 Oct after 37.9 °C 24 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
12 Oct after 40.0 °C 17 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
13 Oct after 38.5 °C 19 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
14 Oct after 39.3 °C 14 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
15 Oct after 37.9 °C 21 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
16 Oct after 38.8 °C 13 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
17 Oct after 37.9 °C 18 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
18 Oct after 39.2 °C 12 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
19 Oct after 39.6 °C 9 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 59
20 Oct after 39.7 °C 6 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 59

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 1 Oct 2025
After · 17 Oct 2025

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 · Copernicus

On 10 October 2025 the air beside the fire reached 122 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 65: 4.3 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak122 µg/m³
Days over the guideline4 days
PM10182 µg/m³
Optical depth1.29
678910111213
Good Fair Moderate Poor Very poor Extremely poor

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 · 100Every 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 Mali ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Ménaka fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 8 October 2025 and 10 October 2025: 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 2,955 hectares (29.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Ménaka (2,968 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 39.9 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 30 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 51, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Mali (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 ADM3 (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.