Skip to content
worldfires
CF · Central African Republic · →

Vassako fire, 17 December 2017 Vassako

Out · last detection 24 Dec 2017, 12:35 UTC

The fire started on 17 December 2017 in Vassako, Central African Republic, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 5,013 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 222th largest in Bamingui-Bangoran since 2016 (of 223 with a page). Number 100 in Central African Republic in 2017, of 100.

Burnt area
5,013ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
8days
17 Dec 2017 – 24 Dec 2017
Municipalities hit
1
sub-prefectures
Started on
17 Dec
2017
Heat detections
111
in a single hotspot: 72 MW
Danger at start
43
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
1.1GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

24 Dec 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 17 Dec24 Dec

How it evolved, day by day

1718192021222324

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

The weather it burned in

39°high
34km/h · peak gust
11%lowest humidity

It had gone 27 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

70% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 3,523 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Vassako where it started
    5,051 ha reached on 17 Dec
    0.2 %

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)
17 Dec 36.5 °C 15 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
18 Dec 36.4 °C 15 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
19 Dec 37.4 °C 15 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
20 Dec 38.2 °C 16 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
21 Dec 38.8 °C 16 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
22 Dec 38.0 °C 22 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
23 Dec 39.3 °C 17 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
24 Dec 38.5 °C 11 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
25 Dec after 36.0 °C 15 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
26 Dec after 35.6 °C 16 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
27 Dec after 35.6 °C 15 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
28 Dec after 35.7 °C 15 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
29 Dec after 34.9 °C 16 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
30 Dec after 35.2 °C 16 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
31 Dec after 36.3 °C 17 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
1 Jan after 34.7 °C 15 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
2 Jan after 33.5 °C 12 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
3 Jan after 32.9 °C 12 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 10 Dec 2017
After · 31 Dec 2017

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 · 111Every 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?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 17 December 2017 and 24 December 2017: 8 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 5,013 hectares (50.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Vassako (5,051 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 39.3 °C, humidity dropped to 11 % and gusts hit 34 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 46, 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.

Report an error
What do you think is wrong?

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 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.