Raga fire, 6 December 2017 Raga
The fire started on 6 December 2017 in Raga, South Sudan, and satellites saw it burning for 4 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 11,635 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 117th largest in Western Bahr el Ghazal since 2016 (of 424 with a page). Number 43 in South Sudan in 2017, of 203.
- Burnt area
- 11,635ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 4days
- 6 Dec 2017 – 9 Dec 2017
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- counties
- Started on
- 6 Dec
- 2017
- Heat detections
- 359
- in a single hotspot: 92 MW
- Danger at start
- 40
- Very high · FWI index
- Energy released
- 4.3GW
- 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 31 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
78% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 11,543 ha in 2016. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 9,075 ha that had burned before.
- 4,743 ha Raga fire, December 2016 13,170 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,156 ha Raga fire, January 2016 21,779 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,815 ha Raga fire, December 2016 62,637 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Raga where it started11,694 ha reached on 4 Dec0.2 %
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 Dec | 37.3 °C | 15 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 7 Dec | 36.3 °C | 16 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 8 Dec | 35.2 °C | 17 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 9 Dec | 36.0 °C | 17 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 10 Dec after | 37.0 °C | 14 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 11 Dec after | 37.8 °C | 13 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 12 Dec after | 38.0 °C | 12 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 13 Dec after | 37.4 °C | 13 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 14 Dec after | 36.9 °C | 14 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 15 Dec after | 35.9 °C | 13 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 16 Dec after | 35.8 °C | 14 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 17 Dec after | 35.9 °C | 14 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 18 Dec after | 36.8 °C | 14 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 19 Dec after | 37.5 °C | 13 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
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.
Detections table · 359Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 21,880 haRaga9 December 2025 · 14 days · 8 km away
- 21,779 haRaga11 January 2016 · 20 days · 9 km away
- 17,603 haAweil Centre28 November 2020 · 10 days · 21 km away
- 62,637 haRaga6 December 2016 · 23 days · 29 km away
- 58,291 haRaga1 December 2019 · 18 days · 29 km away
- 36,949 haAweil Centre4 December 2021 · 11 days · 30 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Raga fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 6 December 2017 and 9 December 2017: 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 11,635 hectares (116.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Raga (11,694 ha, 0.2 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 37.3 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 42 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 South Sudan (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 ADM2 (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.