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Wau fire, 2 January 2016 Wau

Out · last detection 12 Jan 2016, 11:45 UTC

The fire started on 2 January 2016 in Wau, South Sudan, and satellites saw it burning for 11 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 8,397 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 195th largest in Western Bahr el Ghazal since 2016 (of 424 with a page). Number 94 in South Sudan in 2016, of 244.

Burnt area
8,397ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
11days
2 Jan 2016 – 12 Jan 2016
Municipalities hit
1
counties
Started on
2 Jan
2016
Heat detections
255
in a single hotspot: 101 MW
Danger at start
50
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
1.5GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

12 Jan 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 2 Jan12 Jan

How it evolved, day by day

23456789101112

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
41km/h · peak gust
8%lowest humidity

It had gone 30 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. Wau where it started
    8,443 ha reached on 2 Jan
    0.4 %

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)
2 Jan 35.2 °C 13 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
3 Jan 33.9 °C 13 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
4 Jan 35.7 °C 12 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
5 Jan 36.4 °C 13 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
6 Jan 36.9 °C 11 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
7 Jan 37.7 °C 12 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
8 Jan 38.6 °C 9 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
9 Jan 37.9 °C 10 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
10 Jan 36.8 °C 8 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
11 Jan 37.3 °C 9 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
12 Jan 37.4 °C 9 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
13 Jan after 36.9 °C 11 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
14 Jan after 36.6 °C 11 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
15 Jan after 36.4 °C 13 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
16 Jan after 36.8 °C 14 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
17 Jan after 38.3 °C 11 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
18 Jan after 38.3 °C 12 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
19 Jan after 37.5 °C 10 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
20 Jan after 36.3 °C 9 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
21 Jan after 37.3 °C 6 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
22 Jan after 38.7 °C 8 % 27 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 Dec 2015
After · 19 Jan 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 · 255Every 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 South Sudan ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Wau fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 2 January 2016 and 12 January 2016: 11 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 8,397 hectares (84.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Wau (8,443 ha, 0.4 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 38.6 °C, humidity dropped to 8 % and gusts hit 41 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 54, 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

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 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.