Burned area
satellite only3,511ha
Perimeter published by GWIS (Copernicus).
- Source
- GWIS (Copernicus)
- Date
- 11 Jan 2025 – 21 Jan 2025
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page to compare it with.
GH · Ghana · –
Sunyani West fire, 11 January 2025 Sunyani West
Out · last detection 21 Jan 2025, 02:03 UTC
The fire started on 11 January 2025 in Sunyani West, Ghana, and satellites saw it burning for 11 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,511 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 14th largest in Bono since 2016 (of 49 with a page). Number 11 in Ghana in 2025, of 36.
Use this data
Compare with…
Use this data
Fire page data · version 2026-10-27matches the official recordwith caveatssatellite onlymodel
When copying, the sentence is
Tick the figures you want: they make up the lede and the CSV.
Duration by satellite
satellite only11days
11 Jan 2025 to 21 Jan 2025: first and last day with fire on the page.
- Source
- GWIS (Copernicus) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- last detection: 21 Jan 2025, 02:03 UTC
+− cross-check
Satellites pass a few times a day and cloud or smoke can hide the fire: a lack of detections is not an official extinction. Each country’s emergency service declares a fire contained or out.
Start
satellite only11 Jan 2025
First day with fire seen by the satellites or the perimeter.
- Source
- GWIS (Copernicus) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- 11 Jan 2025
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page, so the alert time and the cause are not known here.
Hotspots
satellite only132
VIIRS detections at 375 m. Most intense hotspot: 58 MW.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (Suomi NPP)
- Date
- 11 Jan 2025 – 21 Jan 2025
+− cross-check
There is no official record to compare with. Each hotspot is a pixel detected in one satellite pass, not a separate fire.
The worst day
satellite only736MW
Total radiative power on 19 January 2025; hotspots that day: 57.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (FRP)
- Date
- 19 Jan 2025
+− cross-check
Fire radiative power (FRP) measures the energy the fire gives off when the satellite passes. Added up by day, it compares intensity, not area.
Danger at the start
model47.1FWI · very high
Fire Weather Index (Canadian system) computed by WorldFires for the day the fire started. Consecutive days without rain before: 60.
- Source
- WorldFires calculation (Canadian FWI system)
- Date
- 11 Jan 2025, local noon
- Model
- ERA5 0,25° (ECMWF · Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com
+− cross-check
This is an index computed from weather model data, not a measurement of the fire nor an official warning. Danger warnings are issued by each country’s authority. Emergency number and official warnings
Weather during the fire
model36.5°C · 26% RH
High of 36.5 °C and minimum humidity of 26% on 15 January 2025; gusts of 34 km/h on 17 January 2025.
- Source
- weather model at the fire’s grid cell
- Date
- 11 Jan 2025 – 21 Jan 2025
- Model
- ERA5 0,25° (ECMWF · Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com
+− cross-check
These are model values for a cell of about 25 km, not from a weather station: they may differ from what was measured on the ground.
This page’s change log has been kept since 24 October 2026: every night what it publishes is compared and the difference is logged. Anything earlier is reconstructed from each source’s date and marked as reconstructed.
Show
-
· reconstructed weatherWeather and FWI computed from the ERA5 reanalysis
-
logStart date: 17 January 2025 → 11 January 2025.
-
· reconstructed GHSLPopulation and built-up area computed
What was saved on 27 October 2026
Every night a snapshot of what the page shows is saved. If anything changes, it appears in the list as a log entry.
- Area
- 3,511 ha
- Dates
- 11 Jan 2025 – 21 Jan 2025
- Name
- Sunyani West
- Official record
- —
Versioned permanent link
https://worldfires.org/en/fire/sunyani-west-2025-01-2?v=2026-10-27A version keeps the area, dates, name and official record; the area as it was logged (changes under 2% are not logged). The map, hotspots and weather always show today’s data.
Citation
A lede of about 60 words figures only, no adjectives
CSV for this fire sunyani-west-2025-01-2.csv · daily, no individual hotspots
| fecha | focos_viirs | frp_mw | tmax_c | tmin_c | hr_min_pct | viento_max_kmh | racha_max_kmh | precip_mm | fwi | clase_fwi | dentro_del_incendio |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025-01-11 | 0 | 0 | 35.5 | 21 | 13 | 12.3 | 31 | 0 | 47.1 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2025-01-12 | 0 | 0 | 34.5 | 21.3 | 16 | 11.5 | 29.2 | 0 | 46.5 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2025-01-13 | 0 | 0 | 35.8 | 21.3 | 18 | 8.9 | 21.2 | 0 | 44 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2025-01-14 | 10 | 38 | 35.9 | 22.4 | 21 | 7.9 | 20.2 | 0 | 42.3 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2025-01-15 | 2 | 5 | 36.5 | 23.8 | 26 | 10.9 | 25.9 | 0 | 42.5 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2025-01-16 | 2 | 1 | 36.4 | 24.4 | 19 | 11.4 | 25.6 | 0 | 43.2 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2025-01-17 | 4 | 41 | 34.7 | 23.9 | 11 | 13.8 | 33.5 | 0 | 50 | extremo | 1 |
| 2025-01-18 | 0 | 0 | 33.9 | 23.5 | 12 | 12.3 | 30.2 | 0 | 48.6 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2025-01-19 | 57 | 736 | 36.1 | 19.9 | 11 | 8.1 | 19.4 | 0 | 45 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2025-01-20 | 54 | 362 | 35 | 21.3 | 20 | 9.2 | 22.7 | 0 | 44.3 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2025-01-21 | 3 | 7 | 36.5 | 22.8 | 23 | 9.7 | 24.8 | 0 | 43.4 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2025-01-22 | 0 | 0 | 36 | 23 | 21 | 8.2 | 22.3 | 0 | 42.1 | muy_alto | 0 |
| 2025-01-23 | 0 | 0 | 36.8 | 24.6 | 29 | 15.4 | 29.5 | 0 | 45.4 | muy_alto | 0 |
| 2025-01-24 | 0 | 0 | 36.5 | 24.8 | 35 | 14.2 | 25.9 | 0 | 39.8 | muy_alto | 0 |
| 2025-01-25 | 0 | 0 | 37.8 | 25.6 | 19 | 10.6 | 24.8 | 0 | 41.9 | muy_alto | 0 |
| 2025-01-26 | 0 | 0 | 37 | 25.7 | 30 | 10.8 | 26.3 | 0 | 40 | muy_alto | 0 |
| 2025-01-27 | 0 | 0 | 37 | 23.8 | 19 | 13 | 23.8 | 0 | 44.1 | muy_alto | 0 |
| 2025-01-28 | 0 | 0 | 36.8 | 22.9 | 19 | 9.8 | 22.7 | 0 | 41.1 | muy_alto | 0 |
| 2025-01-29 | 0 | 0 | 37.2 | 23.5 | 19 | 8.4 | 21.6 | 0 | 40 | muy_alto | 0 |
| 2025-01-30 | 0 | 0 | 36.8 | 24.4 | 23 | 9 | 20.5 | 0 | 40.7 | muy_alto | 0 |
| 2025-01-31 | 0 | 0 | 37.1 | 24.7 | 22 | 9.9 | 23.8 | 0 | 41.8 | muy_alto | 0 |
It is generated in your browser from this page’s data: one file per fire, aggregated by day and without individual hotspots.
Live widget for your story
It updates itself while the fire is still active and links to this page. Free, with the attribution shown at the bottom.
Sources for this page: GWIS (Copernicus), NASA FIRMS (VIIRS), ERA5 (ECMWF/Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0), GHSL (JRC). Open-Meteo.com · How we build fire pages: methodology
- Burnt area
- 3,511ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 11days
- 11 Jan 2025 – 21 Jan 2025
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- districts
- Started on
- 11 Jan
- 2025
- Heat detections
- 132
- in a single hotspot: 58 MW
- Danger at start
- 47
- Very high · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 170MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
HOTSPOTS BY DAY
11 Jan21 Jan
21 Jan 2025
How it evolved, day by day
14 Jan
16 Jan
19 Jan
21 Jan
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
34km/h · peak gust
11%lowest humidity
It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
100% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,381 ha in 2016, 2,084 ha in 2017, 573 ha in 2018, 753 ha in 2019, 1,037 ha in 2020, 1,231 ha in 2021, 2,253 ha in 2022, 1,409 ha in 2023, 2,205 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,503 ha that had burned before.
- 2,381 ha Sunyani West fire, January 2016 26,431 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,084 ha Sunyani West fire, February 2017 3,263 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,409 ha Sunyani West fire, January 2023 4,855 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 753 ha Sunyani West fire, January 2019 2,872 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 606 ha Sunyani West fire, January 2024 4,942 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 573 ha Sunyani West fire, January 2018 4,100 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 429 ha Sunyani West fire, January 2024 2,297 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 116 ha Sunyani West fire, February 2020 4,316 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
Berlin boundary: geoBoundaries · Federal Agency for Cartography and Geodesy (dl-de/by-2-0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
Sunyani West where it started3,534 ha reached on 14 Jan3.3 %
Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.
People and buildings inside the perimeter
GHSL 2025Built-up area0.31 ha
Residents< 20
Inside the perimeter there were about 0.31 hectares of built-up land and almost nobody lived there (GHSL 2025, satellite-based estimate).
This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned. The GHSL 2025 epoch is a projection made from 2020 and earlier data.
Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu
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)
Started with Very dry air: 18 % of the area in Ghana 60 days without rain: 16 % of the area in Ghana
| Day | High | Min. humidity | Peak gust | Rain | Danger (FWI) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 11 Jan | 35.5 °C | 13 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 12 Jan | 34.5 °C | 16 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 13 Jan | 35.8 °C | 18 % | 21 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 14 Jan | 35.9 °C | 21 % | 20 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 15 Jan | 36.5 °C | 26 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 16 Jan | 36.4 °C | 19 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 17 Jan | 34.7 °C | 11 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 50 |
| 18 Jan | 33.9 °C | 12 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 19 Jan | 36.1 °C | 11 % | 19 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 20 Jan | 35.0 °C | 20 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 21 Jan | 36.5 °C | 23 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 22 Jan after | 36.0 °C | 21 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 23 Jan after | 36.8 °C | 29 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 24 Jan after | 36.5 °C | 35 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 25 Jan after | 37.8 °C | 19 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 26 Jan after | 37.0 °C | 30 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 27 Jan after | 37.0 °C | 19 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 28 Jan after | 36.8 °C | 19 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 29 Jan after | 37.2 °C | 19 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 30 Jan after | 36.8 °C | 23 % | 20 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 31 Jan after | 37.1 °C | 22 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
Its twins: fires that started in the same weather
It started with an FWI of 47.1, a minimum humidity of 13% and more than two months without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2016: 29.
FWI at the start
47.1
Minimum humidity
13 %
Days without rain
60+
this fire
chosen twins
rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar
Outlines of the closest twins
This fire · Sunyani West fire, 11 January 2025
3,511 ha
11 days
FWI 47.1
Min. humidity 13 %
Sunyani West fire, January 2022
2,538 ha
7 days
FWI 47.1
Min. humidity 11 %
9 km away, in 2022
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
Dormaa fire, February 2016
2,460 ha
7 days
FWI 47.5
Min. humidity 14 %
61 km away, in 2016
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
Sunyani West fire, January 2022
3,525 ha
9 days
FWI 45.9
Min. humidity 11 %
10 km away, in 2022
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
Offinso North fire, January 2022
3,985 ha
22 days
FWI 48.6
Min. humidity 12 %
68 km away, in 2022
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 14.7 mm on 13 Feb.
Atebubu Amantin fire, January 2022
2,164 ha
15 days
FWI 46.4
Min. humidity 13 %
144 km away, in 2022
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
What happened to them
- 7 days
- median duration
- 2,164 ha
- median area
- 100 %
- went past 1,000 ha
- 3.2 mm
- rain at the end (median; 4 of 29 had it)
It was 1.6 times larger than the median of its twins and lasted 11 days, against 7 days.
Only 5 of its 29 twins burned more. The weather on the first day does not explain everything: the wind in the following days, the fuel and the firefighting also count. In 25 of 29, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 3.2 mm.
This is a bank of analogues: it shows what usually happens, not what will happen. With fewer than 15 twins we give no figures. How we calculate it
How it ended
—first rain
—no rain in ten days
34km/h · max. gust
It was considered over on 21 Jan, and not even 1 mm fell in the following ten days: it went out without rain. Twins with rain when they ended: 4 of 29, with a median of 3.2 mm.
Weather on this page: Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)
How a twin is chosen
- Same area: fires that have already ended, less than 250 km from this one, since 2016.
- Same start: we compare the FWI on the first day, the minimum humidity that day and the run of days without rain before it. The slider sets how much they may differ.
- Only pages with final weather data (ERA5 reanalysis) calculated in the same way as this fire’s; agricultural and grass burns and pages with data under review are left out.
- Fires burning at the same time as this one (a week before or after) are left out: they share the same spell of weather and do not count as a precedent.
- They are sorted by similarity, and the outlines of the first five are drawn.
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
↔
Before · 4 Jan 2025
After · 28 Jan 2025
Sentinel-2 did not pass over on that day. Try another date, or use false colour, which is daily.
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 21 January 2025 the air beside the fire reached 92 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 55: 3.7 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
PM2.5 peak92 µg/m³
Days over the guideline10 days
PM10182 µg/m³
Optical depth0.81
WHO 15
15 Jan17 Jan19 Jan21 Jan23 Jan
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 · 132Every 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 time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 4,942 haSunyani West21 January 2024 · 25 days · 3 km away
- 4,855 haSunyani West30 January 2023 · 6 days · 5 km away
- 26,431 haSunyani West22 January 2016 · 27 days · 6 km away
- 8,046 haSunyani West2 February 2020 · 14 days · 17 km away
- 10,631 haSunyani West2 February 2017 · 23 days · 20 km away
- 6,579 haTano North14 January 2016 · 30 days · 39 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Sunyani West fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 11 January 2025 to 21 January 2025 (11 days). The perimeter dates it from 17 January 2025 to 21 January 2025.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 3,511 hectares (35.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Sunyani West (3,534 ha, 3.3 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 36.5 °C, humidity dropped to 11 % and gusts hit 34 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 Ghana (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.
- How did the fires that started in similar weather in this area end?
- Fires less than 250 km away that started since 2016 with a similar FWI, humidity and dry spell: 29. Their median duration was 7 days and their median area 2,164 ha; 100 % went past 1,000 ha. Only 5 of its 29 twins burned more. The weather on the first day does not explain everything: the wind in the following days, the fuel and the firefighting also count. In 25 of 29, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 3.2 mm.
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 · Emergency number and official warnings
Satellite cross-check
History of this page · 1 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
- Start date: 17 January 2025 → 11 January 2025.
RSS Changes to this page With cross-checks and a citable version
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
How we know this
- Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery.
- Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 17 January 2025 to 21 January 2025. 132 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
- We have not matched this page with any official record.
- Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
- Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2025, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.
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.