How long did the Toliary-II fire last?

GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 14 October 2019 and 12 November 2019: 30 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 9,621 hectares (96.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire only entered Toliary-II (9,648 ha, 1.0 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 38.2 °C, humidity dropped to 23 % and gusts hit 54 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 47, class Very high.

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.

MG · Madagascar · 2019-10-14 → 2019-11-12

Toliary-II fire, 14 October 2019 Toliary-II

Out · last detection 13 Nov 2019, 10:26 UTC

The fire started on 14 October 2019 in Toliary-II, Madagascar, and satellites saw it burning for 30 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 9,621 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 11th largest in Atsimo-Andrefana since 2016 (of 45 with a page). Number 2 in Madagascar in 2019, of 38.

Burnt area: 9,621ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 30days; 14 Oct 2019 – 12 Nov 2019
Municipalities hit: 1; districts
Started on: 14 Oct; 2019
Heat detections: 908; in a single hotspot: 95 MW
Danger at start: 28; High · FWI index
Energy released: 7.4GW; sum of detected power

Play back 13 Nov 2019

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 14 Oct12 Nov

How it evolved, day by day

14151617181920212223242526272829301234568910111213

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

The weather it burned in

38°high

54km/h · peak gust

23%lowest humidity

It had gone 8 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 5.2 mm on 15 Nov.

This area had burned before

97% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 7,701 ha in 2016, 9,956 ha in 2017. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 9,375 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

Toliary-II where it started

9,648 ha reached on 7 Oct

1.0 %

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)
7 Oct	31.5 °C	34 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	High 28
8 Oct	32.1 °C	31 %	29 km/h	1.5 mm	Moderate 19
9 Oct	32.0 °C	37 %	29 km/h	2.4 mm	Low 10
10 Oct	31.2 °C	41 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 20
11 Oct	31.0 °C	30 %	50 km/h	0.0 mm	High 32
12 Oct	31.1 °C	37 %	37 km/h	0.3 mm	High 29
13 Oct	31.8 °C	38 %	33 km/h	0.2 mm	High 28
14 Oct	30.0 °C	47 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	High 26
15 Oct	30.6 °C	39 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	High 27
16 Oct	31.4 °C	36 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	High 28
17 Oct	31.8 °C	26 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
18 Oct	31.8 °C	33 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	High 33
19 Oct	32.5 °C	29 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
20 Oct	31.5 °C	30 %	37 km/h	0.4 mm	High 33
21 Oct	32.1 °C	29 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
22 Oct	30.6 °C	43 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	High 30
23 Oct	34.6 °C	35 %	35 km/h	0.2 mm	High 30
24 Oct	32.9 °C	39 %	39 km/h	1.2 mm	High 23
25 Oct	34.7 °C	32 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	High 33
26 Oct	38.2 °C	25 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 41
27 Oct	36.8 °C	23 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 41
28 Oct	35.2 °C	39 %	36 km/h	0.7 mm	High 29
29 Oct	34.8 °C	31 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
30 Oct	33.7 °C	33 %	42 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
31 Oct	33.5 °C	43 %	49 km/h	0.5 mm	Very high 40
1 Nov	30.8 °C	24 %	54 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 47
2 Nov	31.0 °C	23 %	46 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
3 Nov	31.5 °C	34 %	44 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
4 Nov	32.2 °C	32 %	48 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 41
5 Nov	33.8 °C	29 %	42 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
6 Nov	35.1 °C	27 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38
7 Nov	33.8 °C	31 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
8 Nov	32.4 °C	37 %	32 km/h	1.2 mm	High 24
9 Nov	32.8 °C	28 %	52 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
10 Nov	31.3 °C	42 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
11 Nov	31.7 °C	40 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
12 Nov	32.4 °C	39 %	36 km/h	0.3 mm	High 35
13 Nov after	32.6 °C	36 %	42 km/h	0.1 mm	High 35
14 Nov after	31.4 °C	48 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	High 32
15 Nov after	28.8 °C	59 %	36 km/h	5.2 mm	Low 6

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 7 Oct 2019

After · 19 Nov 2019

Before After

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 · 908Every 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

All fires in Madagascar ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Toliary-II fire last?: GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 14 October 2019 and 12 November 2019: 30 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 9,621 hectares (96.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire only entered Toliary-II (9,648 ha, 1.0 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 38.2 °C, humidity dropped to 23 % and gusts hit 54 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 47, class Very high.
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

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · Copernicus ↗

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

What do you think is wrong?

Dates or duration Place or towns Burned area Name It was not a wildfire Same fire as another page Something else

What really happened?

Your connection to the fire (optional) Email (optional)

We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy.

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.

Where it burned