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Ogoja fire, 20 January 2016 Ogoja

Out · last detection 31 Jan 2016, 12:30 UTC

The fire started on 20 January 2016 in Ogoja, Nigeria, and satellites saw it burning for 11 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,628 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 8th largest in Cross River since 2016 (of 37 with a page). Number 50 in Nigeria in 2016, of 198.

Burnt area
3,628ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
11days
20 Jan 2016 – 30 Jan 2016
Municipalities hit
1
local government areas
Started on
20 Jan
2016
Heat detections
145
in a single hotspot: 104 MW
Danger at start
51
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
1.4GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

31 Jan 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 20 Jan30 Jan

How it evolved, day by day

2021222325262728293031

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
52km/h · peak gust
6%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. Ogoja where it started
    3,652 ha reached on 19 Jan
    4.0 %

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)
20 Jan 37.6 °C 12 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
21 Jan 37.4 °C 6 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
22 Jan 37.1 °C 8 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
23 Jan 37.3 °C 7 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
24 Jan 35.5 °C 8 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 64
25 Jan 35.4 °C 11 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 69
26 Jan 35.1 °C 13 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
27 Jan 35.9 °C 10 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 66
28 Jan 35.2 °C 12 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 65
29 Jan 35.4 °C 10 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 67
30 Jan 36.3 °C 10 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 64
31 Jan after 36.3 °C 12 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
1 Feb after 37.2 °C 12 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
2 Feb after 37.4 °C 15 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
3 Feb after 37.5 °C 25 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
4 Feb after 38.6 °C 16 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
5 Feb after 39.7 °C 9 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
6 Feb after 39.1 °C 9 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
7 Feb after 39.5 °C 11 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
8 Feb after 37.3 °C 16 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
9 Feb after 37.5 °C 9 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 13 Jan 2016
After · 6 Feb 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 · 145Every 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 Ogoja fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 20 January 2016 and 30 January 2016: 11 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 3,628 hectares (36.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Ogoja (3,652 ha, 4.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 37.6 °C, humidity dropped to 6 % and gusts hit 52 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 69, 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.