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Vassako fire, 3 December 2016 Vassako

Out · last detection 10 Dec 2016, 12:41 UTC

The fire started on 3 December 2016 in Vassako, Central African Republic, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 10,031 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 64th largest in Bamingui-Bangoran since 2016 (of 223 with a page). Number 64 in Central African Republic in 2016, of 165.

Burnt area
10,031ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
8days
3 Dec 2016 – 10 Dec 2016
Municipalities hit
1
sub-prefectures
Started on
3 Dec
2016
Heat detections
268
in a single hotspot: 130 MW
Danger at start
32
High · FWI index
Energy released
2.8GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

10 Dec 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 3 Dec10 Dec

How it evolved, day by day

345678910

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
29km/h · peak gust
12%lowest humidity

It had gone 17 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

  1. Vassako where it started
    10,104 ha reached on 3 Dec
    0.5 %

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)
3 Dec 36.5 °C 26 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
4 Dec 37.0 °C 22 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
5 Dec 35.9 °C 23 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
6 Dec 36.3 °C 23 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
7 Dec 35.2 °C 25 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
8 Dec 37.8 °C 15 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
9 Dec 37.1 °C 12 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
10 Dec 36.5 °C 14 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
11 Dec after 36.2 °C 17 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
12 Dec after 36.4 °C 18 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
13 Dec after 37.2 °C 15 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
14 Dec after 36.4 °C 14 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
15 Dec after 34.2 °C 30 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
16 Dec after 35.5 °C 20 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
17 Dec after 36.8 °C 16 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
18 Dec after 36.1 °C 11 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
19 Dec after 35.6 °C 15 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
20 Dec after 35.3 °C 14 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 26 Nov 2016
After · 17 Dec 2016

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 · 268Every 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 timeSatelliteFRP (MW)LatLon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Central African Republic ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Vassako fire last?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 3 December 2016 to 10 December 2016 (8 days). The perimeter dates it from 5 December 2016 to 10 December 2016.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 10,031 hectares (100.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Vassako (10,104 ha, 0.5 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 37.8 °C, humidity dropped to 12 % and gusts hit 29 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 44, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Central African Republic (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.

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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 ADM3 (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.