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Rafaï fire, 4 January 2020 Rafaï, Yalinga

Out · last detection 11 Feb 2020, 23:24 UTC

The fire started on 4 January 2020 in Rafaï, Central African Republic, and satellites saw it burning for 38 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 131,336 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

This page is probably a fire complex, not a single fire. GWIS merges into one perimeter the fires that touch over weeks, which in large burning seasons can join dozens of separate fires. The total area is reliable; the origin and dates refer to the whole complex.

It is the largest fire in Mbomou since 2016 (of 80 with a page). Number 6 in Central African Republic in 2020, of 103.

Burnt area
131,336ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
38days
4 Jan 2020 – 10 Feb 2020
Municipalities hit
2
sub-prefectures
Started on
4 Jan
2020
Heat detections
4,964
in a single hotspot: 240 MW
Danger at start
40
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
44.1GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

11 Feb 2020
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 4 Jan10 Feb

How it evolved, day by day

456789101112131415161718192021222324252627282930311234567891011

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

The weather it burned in

38°high
40km/h · peak gust
9%lowest humidity

It had gone 21 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

45% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 53,923 ha in 2016, 33,928 ha in 2017, 2,601 ha in 2018, 4,499 ha in 2019. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 59,105 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Rafaï where it started
    130,297 ha reached on 4 Jan
    4.7 %
  2. Yalinga
    2,009 ha reached on 7 Jan
    0.0 %

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)
6 Jan 34.3 °C 17 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
7 Jan 35.2 °C 15 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
8 Jan 36.0 °C 16 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
9 Jan 35.8 °C 14 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
10 Jan 35.6 °C 14 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
11 Jan 34.0 °C 11 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
12 Jan 32.8 °C 10 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
13 Jan 33.9 °C 9 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
14 Jan 35.7 °C 11 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
15 Jan 37.5 °C 12 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
16 Jan 38.1 °C 11 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
17 Jan 37.3 °C 13 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
18 Jan 35.8 °C 12 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
19 Jan 34.6 °C 14 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
20 Jan 35.2 °C 13 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
21 Jan 34.9 °C 12 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
22 Jan 34.3 °C 10 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
23 Jan 33.2 °C 10 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
24 Jan 33.2 °C 10 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
25 Jan 34.0 °C 10 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
26 Jan 34.6 °C 13 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
27 Jan 35.7 °C 12 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
28 Jan 36.4 °C 12 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
29 Jan 36.5 °C 9 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 28 Dec 2019
After · 17 Feb 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.

Detections table · 4,964Every 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 Central African Republic ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Rafaï fire last?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 4 January 2020 to 10 February 2020 (38 days). The perimeter dates it from 6 January 2020 to 8 February 2020.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 131,336 hectares (1,313.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Rafaï (130,297 ha, 4.7 %); Yalinga (2,009 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 38.1 °C, humidity dropped to 9 % and gusts hit 40 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 50, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Central African Republic (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 (Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY 3.0 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.