Skip to content
worldfires
DZ · Algeria · →

Ouled Hellal fire, 13 August 2020 أولاد هلال · Ouled Hellal

Out · last measured on 13 Aug 2020

The fire started on 13 August 2020 in Ouled Hellal, Algeria, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 144 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 44th largest in Médéa since 2016 (of 55 with a page). Number 180 in Algeria in 2020, of 236.

We have the Copernicus perimeter for this fire, but the VIIRS sensors did not capture it in enough detail: no day-by-day evolution, but the split by municipality is there.

Burnt area
144ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
1day
13 Aug 2020 – 13 Aug 2020
Municipalities hit
1
communes
Started on
13 Aug
2020
Danger at start
36
High · FWI index

Where it burned

The weather it burned in

36°high
40km/h · peak gust
18%lowest humidity

It had gone 21 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.7 mm on 15 Aug.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Ouled Hellal أولاد هلال 3,367 inhabitants · 1.3 km from the town where it started
    144 ha
    0.7 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the official 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.

What burned

  • Mixed forest47 %
  • Broadleaved forest33 %
  • Other natural land20 %

Land cover inside the perimeter as reported by Copernicus EFFIS (outside the Corine Land Cover area).

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)
13 Aug 35.9 °C 18 % 40 km/h 1.2 mm High 36
14 Aug after 35.3 °C 16 % 32 km/h 0.2 mm Very high 46
15 Aug after 35.2 °C 22 % 46 km/h 1.7 mm High 31

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 6 Aug 2020
After · 20 Aug 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.

The smoke

CAMS · Copernicus

On 14 August 2020 the air beside the fire reached 28 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 19: 1.2 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak28 µg/m³
Days over the guideline2 days
PM1046 µg/m³
111213141516
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)

Other fires nearby

All fires in Algeria ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Ouled Hellal fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 13 August 2020 and 13 August 2020: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 144 hectares (1.4 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Ouled Hellal (144 ha, 0.7 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 1.3 km of Ouled Hellal. That is the distance to the perimeter or nearest hotspot; it does not mean it entered the houses.
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 35.9 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 40 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 36, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Algeria (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: 14 · 1021

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 14 · 1021.

Where this data comes from

The perimeter and land cover come from the Copernicus European Forest Fire Information System (EFFIS), measured on MODIS and Sentinel-2 imagery and published under CC BY 4.0. 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-ShareAlike 2.0). The area per municipality is computed by WorldFires by crossing the perimeter with those boundaries, so it may differ slightly from each country’s official figure.