Uror fire, 1 February 2020 Uror
The fire started on 1 February 2020 in Uror, South Sudan, and satellites saw it burning for 4 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 7,081 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 226th largest in Jonglei since 2016 (of 427 with a page). Number 104 in South Sudan in 2020, of 190.
- Burnt area
- 7,081ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 4days
- 1 Feb 2020 – 4 Feb 2020
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- counties
- Started on
- 1 Feb
- 2020
- Heat detections
- 139
- in a single hotspot: 229 MW
- Danger at start
- 46
- Very high · FWI index
- Energy released
- 3.2GW
- 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 more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
19% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 746 ha in 2016, 843 ha in 2018. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 1,379 ha that had burned before.
What happened to each town
-
Uror where it started7,128 ha reached on 1 Feb0.6 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 Feb | 34.5 °C | 16 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 2 Feb | 36.0 °C | 15 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 3 Feb | 36.5 °C | 15 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 4 Feb | 35.7 °C | 15 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 5 Feb after | 33.8 °C | 11 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 6 Feb after | 35.7 °C | 25 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 7 Feb after | 37.2 °C | 13 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 8 Feb after | 38.2 °C | 16 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 54 |
| 9 Feb after | 37.1 °C | 18 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 10 Feb after | 36.8 °C | 20 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 59 |
| 11 Feb after | 34.7 °C | 15 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 59 |
| 12 Feb after | 34.7 °C | 15 % | 43 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 58 |
| 13 Feb after | 35.9 °C | 16 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 53 |
| 14 Feb after | 36.7 °C | 14 % | 28 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.
Detections table · 139Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 16,673 haUror12 February 2020 · 3 days · 14 km away
- 14,820 haUror31 December 2021 · 5 days · 14 km away
- 16,330 haUror9 December 2016 · 9 days · 18 km away
- 14,981 haUror2 January 2022 · 4 days · 22 km away
- 17,474 haUror14 January 2026 · 7 days · 30 km away
- 13,753 haUror28 January 2021 · 5 days · 31 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Uror fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 1 February 2020 and 4 February 2020: 4 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 7,081 hectares (70.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Uror (7,128 ha, 0.6 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 36.5 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 34 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 48, class Very high.
- 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
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 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.