Poli fire, 20 January 2025 Poli
The fire started on 20 January 2025 in Poli, Cameroon, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,529 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 45th largest in North since 2016 (of 1648 with a page). Number 34 in Cameroon in 2025, of 396.
- Burnt area
- 4,529ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 8days
- 20 Jan 2025 – 27 Jan 2025
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- communes
- Started on
- 20 Jan
- 2025
- Heat detections
- 158
- in a single hotspot: 161 MW
- Danger at start
- 40
- Very high · FWI index
- Energy released
- 2.4GW
- 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 more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
73% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 105 ha in 2016, 327 ha in 2017, 377 ha in 2018, 1,462 ha in 2019, 1,404 ha in 2020, 743 ha in 2021, 391 ha in 2023. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,302 ha that had burned before.
- 971 ha Poli fire, January 2019 1,700 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 870 ha Poli fire, January 2020 1,080 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 704 ha Poli fire, January 2021 1,201 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 491 ha Poli fire, January 2019 2,395 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 430 ha Poli fire, January 2020 3,099 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 391 ha Poli fire, December 2023 3,710 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 377 ha Poli fire, January 2018 1,111 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 327 ha Poli fire, January 2017 1,412 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Poli where it started4,560 ha reached on 13 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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 20 Jan | 37.3 °C | 29 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 21 Jan | 37.9 °C | 24 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 22 Jan | 37.9 °C | 14 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 23 Jan | 37.7 °C | 13 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 24 Jan | 37.2 °C | 12 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 25 Jan | 36.9 °C | 14 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 26 Jan | 36.6 °C | 15 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 27 Jan | 36.5 °C | 14 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 28 Jan after | 35.7 °C | 15 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 29 Jan after | 35.6 °C | 15 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 30 Jan after | 35.8 °C | 13 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 31 Jan after | 35.2 °C | 14 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 1 Feb after | 36.0 °C | 13 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 2 Feb after | 37.7 °C | 15 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 3 Feb after | 38.7 °C | 14 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 50 |
| 4 Feb after | 38.3 °C | 10 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 50 |
| 5 Feb after | 37.9 °C | 11 % | 20 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 6 Feb after | 38.8 °C | 11 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
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 29 January 2025 the air beside the fire reached 74 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 57: 3.8 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 · 158Every 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 Poli fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 20 January 2025 and 27 January 2025: 8 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 4,529 hectares (45.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Poli (4,560 ha, 0.4 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 37.9 °C, humidity dropped to 12 % and gusts hit 32 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 48, 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.
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 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.