Sollé fire, 20 October 2025 Baraboulé, Sollé
The fire started on 20 October 2025 in Sollé, Burkina Faso, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 5,912 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.
It is the 5th largest in Yaadga since 2016 (of 74 with a page). Number 44 in Burkina Faso in 2025, of 609.
- Burnt area
- 5,912ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 5days
- 20 Oct 2025 – 24 Oct 2025
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- communes
- Started on
- 20 Oct
- 2025
- Heat detections
- 127
- in a single hotspot: 166 MW
- Danger at start
- 28
- High · FWI index
- Energy released
- 2.4GW
- 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 3 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
47% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 920 ha in 2021, 1,300 ha in 2022, 1,812 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,790 ha that had burned before.
- 1,300 ha Baraboulé fire, November 2022 2,144 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,001 ha Baraboulé fire, November 2024 1,166 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 920 ha Baraboulé fire, January 2021 1,205 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 811 ha Baraboulé fire, November 2024 1,304 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
4,332 ha reached on 21 Oct5.1 %
-
Sollé where it started926 ha reached on 20 Oct2.6 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 20 Oct | 37.3 °C | 26 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 21 Oct | 36.8 °C | 29 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 22 Oct | 38.0 °C | 23 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 23 Oct | 38.6 °C | 22 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 24 Oct | 38.0 °C | 25 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 25 Oct after | 38.5 °C | 17 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 35 |
| 26 Oct after | 37.8 °C | 22 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 27 Oct after | 38.4 °C | 20 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 28 Oct after | 38.9 °C | 16 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 38 |
| 29 Oct after | 37.8 °C | 21 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 30 Oct after | 37.5 °C | 20 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 31 Oct after | 37.6 °C | 19 % | 19 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 1 Nov after | 37.7 °C | 16 % | 20 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 2 Nov after | 38.9 °C | 8 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 56 |
| 3 Nov after | 37.3 °C | 14 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
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.
The smoke
CAMS · CopernicusOn 19 October 2025 the air beside the fire reached 34 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 23: 1.5 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
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 · 127Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Sollé fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 20 October 2025 and 24 October 2025: 5 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 5,912 hectares (59.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Baraboulé (4,332 ha, 5.1 %); Sollé (926 ha, 2.6 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 38.6 °C, humidity dropped to 22 % and gusts hit 32 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 36, class High.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Burkina Faso (OCHA COD-AB). 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 OCHA COD-AB (Institut Geographique Burkina (IGB)) (Creative Commons Attribution for Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY-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.