Nzara fire, 10 January 2025 Nzara, Yambio
The fire started on 10 January 2025 in Nzara, South Sudan, and satellites saw it burning for 9 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 14,266 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.
It is the 87th largest in Western Equatoria since 2016 (of 361 with a page). Number 78 in South Sudan in 2025, of 292.
- Burnt area
- 14,266ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 9days
- 10 Jan 2025 – 18 Jan 2025
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- counties
- Started on
- 10 Jan
- 2025
- Heat detections
- 625
- in a single hotspot: 254 MW
- Danger at start
- 50
- Extreme · FWI index
- Energy released
- 5.4GW
- sum of detected power
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 59 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
100% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 18,551 ha in 2016, 3,716 ha in 2017, 3,218 ha in 2018, 793 ha in 2019, 9,411 ha in 2020, 1,162 ha in 2021, 6,983 ha in 2022, 4,436 ha in 2023, 9,451 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 14,324 ha that had burned before.
- 11,617 ha Nzara fire, December 2016 156,948 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 7,231 ha Nzara fire, January 2024 89,622 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 6,214 ha Yambio fire, December 2022 33,404 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 4,593 ha Nzara fire, January 2020 7,179 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,728 ha Nzara fire, January 2016 10,703 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Nzara where it started11,259 ha reached on 9 Jan1.7 %
-
3,122 ha reached on 15 Jan0.4 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10 Jan | 37.6 °C | 11 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 50 |
| 11 Jan | 35.5 °C | 12 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 51 |
| 12 Jan | 34.8 °C | 14 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 53 |
| 13 Jan | 34.5 °C | 12 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 50 |
| 14 Jan | 36.3 °C | 12 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 51 |
| 15 Jan | 37.4 °C | 13 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 54 |
| 16 Jan | 37.5 °C | 15 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 54 |
| 17 Jan | 37.6 °C | 18 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 50 |
| 18 Jan | 38.3 °C | 15 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 19 Jan after | 38.4 °C | 14 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 20 Jan after | 36.8 °C | 19 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 51 |
| 21 Jan after | 35.8 °C | 21 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 22 Jan after | 37.1 °C | 18 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 23 Jan after | 36.7 °C | 14 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 24 Jan after | 36.7 °C | 12 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 50 |
| 25 Jan after | 36.3 °C | 11 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 50 |
| 26 Jan after | 36.5 °C | 8 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 51 |
| 27 Jan after | 36.1 °C | 9 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 53 |
| 28 Jan after | 35.4 °C | 10 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 53 |
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 9 January 2025 the air beside the fire reached 145 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 95: 6.3 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 · 625Every 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 Nzara fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 10 January 2025 and 18 January 2025: 9 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 14,266 hectares (142.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Nzara (11,259 ha, 1.7 %); Yambio (3,122 ha, 0.4 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 38.3 °C, humidity dropped to 11 % and gusts hit 37 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 54, class Extreme.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of South 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.
Report an error
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.