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Sakaba fire, 17 January 2026 Sakaba

Out · last detection 23 Jan 2026, 13:32 UTC

The fire started on 17 January 2026 in Sakaba, Nigeria, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,003 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 12th largest in Kebbi since 2016 (of 42 with a page). Number 75 in Nigeria in 2026, of 262.

The power measured by the satellite is low (14.1 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
4,003ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
7days
17 Jan 2026 – 23 Jan 2026
Municipalities hit
1
local government areas
Started on
17 Jan
2026
Heat detections
75
in a single hotspot: 14 MW
Danger at start
41
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
281MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

23 Jan 2026
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 17 Jan23 Jan

How it evolved, day by day

171820212223

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

The weather it burned in

35°high
32km/h · peak gust
13%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

99% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,217 ha in 2016, 776 ha in 2017, 1,638 ha in 2018, 903 ha in 2020, 1,109 ha in 2021, 819 ha in 2022, 3,454 ha in 2023, 1,164 ha in 2024, 3,338 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,971 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Sakaba where it started
    4,026 ha reached on 14 Jan
    2.9 %

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)
17 Jan 34.8 °C 21 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
18 Jan 34.1 °C 28 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
19 Jan 33.5 °C 26 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
20 Jan 33.5 °C 13 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
21 Jan 31.7 °C 19 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
22 Jan 30.1 °C 17 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
23 Jan 33.0 °C 18 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
24 Jan after 34.8 °C 20 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
25 Jan after 34.8 °C 16 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
26 Jan after 34.3 °C 11 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
27 Jan after 33.4 °C 18 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
28 Jan after 34.1 °C 18 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
29 Jan after 34.8 °C 17 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
30 Jan after 34.9 °C 15 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
31 Jan after 35.7 °C 17 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
1 Feb after 35.7 °C 19 % 17 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
2 Feb after 36.9 °C 17 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 10 Jan 2026
After · 30 Jan 2026

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 · Copernicus

On 15 January 2026 the air beside the fire reached 184 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 144: 9.6 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak184 µg/m³
Days over the guideline12 days
PM10902 µg/m³
Optical depth1.20
151617181920212223242526
Good Fair Moderate Poor Very poor Extremely poor

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 · 75Every 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 Nigeria ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Sakaba fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 17 January 2026 and 23 January 2026: 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 4,003 hectares (40.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Sakaba (4,026 ha, 2.9 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 34.8 °C, humidity dropped to 13 % 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 Nigeria (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.

Emergency number: 112

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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We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy. This is not an emergency service: if there is a fire now, call 112.

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 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)). 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.