Pama fire, 7 November 2024 Pama, Madjoari
The fire started on 7 November 2024 in Pama, Burkina Faso, and satellites saw it burning for 32 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 43,278 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.
It is the 2th largest in Goulmou since 2016 (of 529 with a page). The largest in Burkina Faso in 2024, of 380.
Compare with…
Suggestions: Madjoari · 2017Pama · 2021Pama · 2023Pama · 2020
- Burnt area
- 43,278ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 32days
- 7 Nov 2024 – 8 Dec 2024
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- communes
- Started on
- 7 Nov
- 2024
- Heat detections
- 1,962
- in a single hotspot: 373 MW
- Danger at start
- 34
- High · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 1.0GW
- detected power per day, on average
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 30 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
89% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 11,346 ha in 2016, 17,592 ha in 2017, 9,132 ha in 2019, 11,499 ha in 2020, 15,768 ha in 2021, 7,799 ha in 2022, 11,338 ha in 2023. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 38,436 ha that had burned before.
- 10,436 ha Madjoari fire, November 2017 39,204 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 6,838 ha Pama fire, November 2021 9,283 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,954 ha Pama fire, November 2023 5,775 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,744 ha Pama fire, December 2020 16,698 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,355 ha Pama fire, November 2017 9,106 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,060 ha Pama fire, November 2016 4,802 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,699 ha Pama fire, November 2016 7,426 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,546 ha Madjoari fire, November 2023 4,963 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
Berlin boundary: geoBoundaries · Federal Agency for Cartography and Geodesy (dl-de/by-2-0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
Pama where it started43,272 ha reached on 7 Nov8.4 %
-
286 ha reached on 9 Nov0.2 %
Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.
People and buildings inside the perimeter
GHSL 2025Inside the perimeter there were about 0.92 hectares of built-up land and about 200 residents (GHSL 2025, satellite-based estimate).
This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned. The GHSL 2025 epoch is a projection made from 2020 and earlier data.
Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 7 Nov | 34.2 °C | 23 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 8 Nov | 34.5 °C | 27 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 9 Nov | 34.8 °C | 24 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 10 Nov | 34.8 °C | 21 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 11 Nov | 34.8 °C | 21 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 12 Nov | 35.5 °C | 22 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 35 |
| 13 Nov | 36.3 °C | 25 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 14 Nov | 37.2 °C | 22 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 38 |
| 15 Nov | 37.2 °C | 20 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 16 Nov | 36.5 °C | 15 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 17 Nov | 35.2 °C | 15 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 18 Nov | 34.7 °C | 17 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 19 Nov | 34.7 °C | 19 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 20 Nov | 35.1 °C | 17 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 21 Nov | 35.0 °C | 15 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 22 Nov | 34.9 °C | 16 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 23 Nov | 36.1 °C | 15 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 24 Nov | 36.3 °C | 14 % | 43 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 54 |
| 25 Nov | 36.4 °C | 13 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 50 |
| 26 Nov | 34.9 °C | 15 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 27 Nov | 33.6 °C | 17 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 28 Nov | 32.8 °C | 18 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 51 |
| 29 Nov | 32.4 °C | 18 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 51 |
| 30 Nov | 33.0 °C | 18 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 1 Dec | 33.9 °C | 17 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 2 Dec | 35.3 °C | 16 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 3 Dec | 35.4 °C | 15 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 4 Dec | 33.8 °C | 14 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 5 Dec | 34.4 °C | 13 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 55 |
| 6 Dec | 33.4 °C | 14 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 50 |
| 7 Dec | 34.1 °C | 14 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 53 |
| 8 Dec | 32.8 °C | 16 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 54 |
| 9 Dec after | 34.2 °C | 17 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 50 |
| 10 Dec after | 36.0 °C | 17 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 11 Dec after | 37.4 °C | 16 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 55 |
| 12 Dec after | 36.2 °C | 15 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 57 |
| 13 Dec after | 36.7 °C | 10 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 58 |
| 14 Dec after | 36.5 °C | 7 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 65 |
| 15 Dec after | 34.9 °C | 10 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 61 |
| 16 Dec after | 34.1 °C | 11 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 60 |
| 17 Dec after | 34.3 °C | 13 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 57 |
| 18 Dec after | 33.3 °C | 12 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 62 |
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 1 December 2024 the air beside the fire reached 85 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 72: 4.8 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 · 1,962Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 16,698 haPama14 December 2020 · 19 days · 3 km away
- 39,204 haMadjoari6 November 2017 · 16 days · 14 km away
- 9,283 haPama29 November 2021 · 14 days · 25 km away
- 22,723 haMadjoari25 November 2021 · 24 days · 31 km away
- 13,536 haPama16 November 2016 · 8 days · 34 km away
- 56,922 haPama2 November 2025 · 42 days · 38 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Pama fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 7 November 2024 to 8 December 2024 (32 days). The perimeter dates it from 12 November 2024 to 1 December 2024.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 43,278 hectares (432.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Pama (43,272 ha, 8.4 %); Madjoari (286 ha, 0.2 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 37.2 °C, humidity dropped to 13 % and gusts hit 43 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 55, class Extreme.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Burkina Faso (OCHA COD-AB). 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
History of this page · 2 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
- Last day with fire: 1 December 2024 → 8 December 2024.
- Start date: 12 November 2024 → 7 November 2024.
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
How we know this
- Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery; 10 polygons grouped in this page.
- Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 12 November 2024 to 1 December 2024. 1,962 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
- We have not matched this page with any official record.
- Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
- Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2025, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.
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 OCHA COD-AB (Institut Geographique Burkina (IGB)) (Creative Commons Attribution for Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY-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.