How long did the Quara fire last?

GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 3 November 2016 and 6 November 2016: 4 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 3,853 hectares (38.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire only entered Quara (3,878 ha, 0.4 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 40.6 °C, humidity dropped to 9 % and gusts hit 30 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 49, class Very high.

Where does this data come from?

From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Ethiopia (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

ET · Ethiopia · 2016-11-03 → 2016-11-06

Quara fire, 3 November 2016 Quara

Out · last detection 6 Nov 2016, 11:39 UTC

The fire started on 3 November 2016 in Quara, Ethiopia, and satellites saw it burning for 4 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,853 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 58th largest in Amhara since 2016 (of 171 with a page). Number 97 in Ethiopia in 2016, of 309.

Burnt area: 3,853ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 4days; 3 Nov 2016 – 6 Nov 2016
Municipalities hit: 1; districts
Started on: 3 Nov; 2016
Heat detections: 93; in a single hotspot: 97 MW
Danger at start: 45; Very high · FWI index
Energy released: 941MW; sum of detected power

Play back 6 Nov 2016

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 3 Nov6 Nov

How it evolved, day by day

3456

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

The weather it burned in

41°high

30km/h · peak gust

9%lowest humidity

It had gone 8 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.5 mm on 9 Nov.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

Quara where it started

3,878 ha reached on 3 Nov

0.4 %

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)
3 Nov	40.5 °C	9 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 45
4 Nov	39.8 °C	10 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 45
5 Nov	40.6 °C	11 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 47
6 Nov	39.9 °C	13 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 49
7 Nov after	40.3 °C	16 %	33 km/h	0.1 mm	Very high 50
8 Nov after	38.6 °C	17 %	22 km/h	0.2 mm	Very high 48
9 Nov after	38.1 °C	15 %	27 km/h	1.5 mm	High 36

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 27 Oct 2016

After · 13 Nov 2016

Before After

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 · 93Every 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 time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Ethiopia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Quara fire last?: GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 3 November 2016 and 6 November 2016: 4 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 3,853 hectares (38.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire only entered Quara (3,878 ha, 0.4 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 40.6 °C, humidity dropped to 9 % and gusts hit 30 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 49, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?: From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Ethiopia (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

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · Copernicus ↗

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.

Where it burned