Skip to content
worldfires
NG · Nigeria · →

Mokwa fire, January 2016 Mokwa, Lavun

Out · last detection 15 Jan 2016, 12:31 UTC

The fire started on 8 January 2016 in Mokwa, Nigeria, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,325 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 130th largest in Niger since 2016 (of 271 with a page). Number 63 in Nigeria in 2016, of 198.

Burnt area
3,325ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
7days
8 Jan 2016 – 14 Jan 2016
Municipalities hit
2
local government areas
Started on
8 Jan
2016
Heat detections
112
in a single hotspot: 54 MW
Danger at start
44
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
719MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

15 Jan 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 8 Jan14 Jan

How it evolved, day by day

89101112131415

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

The weather it burned in

38°high
28km/h · peak gust
11%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months 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. Mokwa where it started
    1,888 ha reached on 6 Jan
    0.5 %
  2. Lavun
    1,458 ha reached on 8 Jan
    0.4 %

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 Jan 36.9 °C 14 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
9 Jan 37.1 °C 13 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
10 Jan 36.7 °C 14 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
11 Jan 37.5 °C 14 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
12 Jan 36.5 °C 11 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
13 Jan 35.7 °C 14 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
14 Jan 35.2 °C 17 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
15 Jan after 36.9 °C 13 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
16 Jan after 35.6 °C 17 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
17 Jan after 36.0 °C 20 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
18 Jan after 37.0 °C 18 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
19 Jan after 36.2 °C 16 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
20 Jan after 34.8 °C 14 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
21 Jan after 34.8 °C 13 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
22 Jan after 35.2 °C 11 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
23 Jan after 35.1 °C 11 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
24 Jan after 33.5 °C 11 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 1 Jan 2016
After · 21 Jan 2016

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 · 112Every 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 Mokwa fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 8 January 2016 and 14 January 2016: 7 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 3,325 hectares (33.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Mokwa (1,888 ha, 0.5 %); Lavun (1,458 ha, 0.4 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 37.5 °C, humidity dropped to 11 % and gusts hit 28 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 52, class Extreme.
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.