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Soalala fire, September 2017 Soalala

Out · last detection 5 Oct 2017, 10:47 UTC

The fire started on 29 September 2017 in Soalala, Madagascar, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,203 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 21th largest in Boeny since 2016 (of 41 with a page). Number 22 in Madagascar in 2017, of 57.

Burnt area
3,203ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
7days
29 Sept 2017 – 5 Oct 2017
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
29 Sept
2017
Heat detections
105
in a single hotspot: 171 MW
Danger at start
39
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
2.5GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

5 Oct 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 29 Sept5 Oct

How it evolved, day by day

29301245

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

The weather it burned in

36°high
45km/h · peak gust
18%lowest humidity

It had gone 5 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

1% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 39 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Soalala where it started
    3,214 ha reached on 24 Sept
    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)
29 Sept 35.6 °C 26 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
30 Sept 34.7 °C 26 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
1 Oct 35.1 °C 24 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
2 Oct 35.4 °C 27 % 35 km/h 0.3 mm Very high 42
3 Oct 34.0 °C 35 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
4 Oct 35.7 °C 18 % 45 km/h 0.1 mm Extreme 50
5 Oct 35.7 °C 21 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
6 Oct after 35.2 °C 30 % 43 km/h 0.1 mm Very high 44
7 Oct after 34.7 °C 24 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
8 Oct after 33.2 °C 24 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
9 Oct after 34.4 °C 30 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
10 Oct after 33.9 °C 40 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
11 Oct after 33.0 °C 46 % 32 km/h 0.2 mm High 31
12 Oct after 34.0 °C 45 % 44 km/h 0.4 mm High 37
13 Oct after 38.1 °C 28 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
14 Oct after 35.5 °C 34 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
15 Oct after 34.2 °C 37 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 22 Sept 2017
After · 12 Oct 2017

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 · 105Every 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 Madagascar ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Soalala fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 29 September 2017 and 5 October 2017: 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 3,203 hectares (32.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Soalala (3,214 ha, 0.4 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 35.7 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 45 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 Madagascar (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 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.