Ulang fire, 10 February 2026 Ulang, Nyirol
The fire started on 10 February 2026 in Ulang, South Sudan, and satellites saw it burning for 34 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 25,052 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.
It is the 25th largest in Upper Nile since 2016 (of 285 with a page). Number 12 in South Sudan in 2026, of 192.
Compare with…
Suggestions: Ulang · 2024Ulang · 2016Ulang · 2023Ulang · 2021
- Burnt area
- 25,052ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 34days
- 10 Feb 2026 – 15 Mar 2026
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- counties
- Started on
- 10 Feb
- 2026
- Heat detections
- 850
- in a single hotspot: 198 MW
- Danger at start
- 44
- Very high · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 469MW
- detected power per day, on average
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 more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.4 mm on 21 Mar.
This area had burned before
94% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 9,137 ha in 2016, 14,603 ha in 2017, 3,620 ha in 2018, 8,141 ha in 2019, 3,415 ha in 2020, 9,153 ha in 2021, 24,415 ha in 2022, 11,030 ha in 2023, 13,851 ha in 2024, 16,007 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 23,667 ha that had burned before.
- 7,162 ha Ulang fire, February 2024 14,721 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 6,269 ha Ulang fire, January 2016 11,109 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 5,001 ha Ulang fire, March 2023 10,964 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 4,427 ha Ulang fire, March 2021 13,943 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,958 ha Ulang fire, March 2022 6,279 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,368 ha Akobo fire, January 2022 63,860 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,707 ha Ulang fire, February 2017 5,531 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,446 ha Nyirol fire, February 2016 7,633 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
-
Ulang where it started24,398 ha reached on 10 Feb5.0 %
-
819 ha reached on 21 Feb0.1 %
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 2025Inside the perimeter there were about 0.13 hectares of built-up land and about 200 residents (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)
| Day | High | Min. humidity | Peak gust | Rain | Danger (FWI) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10 Feb | 35.0 °C | 27 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 11 Feb | 38.9 °C | 15 % | 19 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 12 Feb | 37.5 °C | 13 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 13 Feb | 39.7 °C | 13 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 14 Feb | 39.8 °C | 14 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 56 |
| 15 Feb | 38.8 °C | 16 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 53 |
| 16 Feb | 38.1 °C | 25 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 17 Feb | 39.1 °C | 23 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 18 Feb | 39.1 °C | 16 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 19 Feb | 36.0 °C | 20 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 20 Feb | 37.7 °C | 19 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 21 Feb | 38.6 °C | 14 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 59 |
| 22 Feb | 38.0 °C | 12 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 63 |
| 23 Feb | 37.0 °C | 12 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 63 |
| 24 Feb | 35.6 °C | 13 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 64 |
| 25 Feb | 35.7 °C | 14 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 62 |
| 26 Feb | 36.5 °C | 17 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 62 |
| 27 Feb | 36.9 °C | 14 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 62 |
| 28 Feb | 35.9 °C | 11 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 60 |
| 1 Mar | 37.4 °C | 11 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 60 |
| 2 Mar | 35.9 °C | 9 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 60 |
| 3 Mar | 35.3 °C | 9 % | 47 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 68 |
| 4 Mar | 35.4 °C | 8 % | 48 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 69 |
| 5 Mar | 35.8 °C | 10 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 60 |
| 6 Mar | 36.6 °C | 11 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 56 |
| 7 Mar | 37.5 °C | 10 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 50 |
| 8 Mar | 38.9 °C | 9 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 55 |
| 9 Mar | 39.1 °C | 8 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 65 |
| 10 Mar | 37.8 °C | 9 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 61 |
| 11 Mar | 38.2 °C | 11 % | 21 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 12 Mar | 41.1 °C | 9 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 56 |
| 13 Mar | 39.6 °C | 9 % | 20 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 14 Mar | 40.1 °C | 17 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 55 |
| 15 Mar | 39.1 °C | 22 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 58 |
| 16 Mar after | 37.3 °C | 23 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 59 |
| 17 Mar after | 36.3 °C | 26 % | 45 km/h | 0.1 mm | Extreme 53 |
| 18 Mar after | 32.4 °C | 40 % | 34 km/h | 0.5 mm | High 37 |
| 19 Mar after | 36.7 °C | 33 % | 26 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 33 |
| 20 Mar after | 37.6 °C | 28 % | 24 km/h | 0.3 mm | High 36 |
| 21 Mar after | 30.4 °C | 44 % | 40 km/h | 1.4 mm | High 21 |
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 7 March 2026 the air beside the fire reached 73 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 44: 2.9 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 · 850Every 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 Ulang fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 10 February 2026 to 15 March 2026 (34 days). The perimeter dates it from 17 February 2026 to 14 March 2026.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 25,052 hectares (250.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Ulang (24,398 ha, 5.0 %); Nyirol (819 ha, 0.1 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 41.1 °C, humidity dropped to 8 % and gusts hit 48 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 69, class Extreme.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of South Sudan (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
History of this page · 2 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
- Last day with fire: 14 March 2026 → 15 March 2026.
- Start date: 17 February 2026 → 10 February 2026.
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; 3 polygons grouped in this page.
- Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 17 February 2026 to 14 March 2026. 850 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 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.