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Poli fire, 23 December 2017 Poli

Out · last detection 30 Dec 2017, 01:17 UTC

The fire started on 23 December 2017 in Poli, Cameroon, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,213 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 115th largest in North since 2016 (of 1648 with a page). Number 18 in Cameroon in 2017, of 294.

The power measured by the satellite is low (23.1 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.

Burnt area
3,213ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
7days
23 Dec 2017 – 29 Dec 2017
Municipalities hit
1
communes
Started on
23 Dec
2017
Heat detections
73
in a single hotspot: 23 MW
Danger at start
41
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
292MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

30 Dec 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 23 Dec29 Dec

How it evolved, day by day

2324252627282930

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

The weather it burned in

34°high
37km/h · peak gust
21%lowest humidity

It had gone 33 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

4% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 130 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Poli where it started
    3,230 ha reached on 23 Dec
    0.3 %

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)
23 Dec 33.8 °C 22 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
24 Dec 31.9 °C 23 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
25 Dec 30.3 °C 26 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
26 Dec 30.4 °C 23 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
27 Dec 31.3 °C 21 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
28 Dec 32.1 °C 21 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
29 Dec 31.6 °C 23 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
30 Dec after 31.1 °C 23 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
31 Dec after 30.1 °C 24 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
1 Jan after 29.0 °C 21 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
2 Jan after 28.9 °C 19 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
3 Jan after 29.6 °C 20 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
4 Jan after 29.3 °C 16 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
5 Jan after 28.6 °C 16 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
6 Jan after 30.7 °C 17 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
7 Jan after 32.0 °C 18 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
8 Jan after 32.1 °C 17 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 16 Dec 2017
After · 5 Jan 2018

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 · 73Every 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 Cameroon ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Poli fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 23 December 2017 and 29 December 2017: 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 3,213 hectares (32.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Poli (3,230 ha, 0.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 33.8 °C, humidity dropped to 21 % and gusts hit 37 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 41, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Cameroon (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.

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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 ADM3 (Open Data Commons Open Database License 1.0). 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.