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West Mims Fire, April 2017 Ware, Charlton, Clinch

Out · last detection 22 May 2017, 07:19 UTC

The fire started on 6 April 2017 in Ware, United States, and satellites saw it burning for 47 days. United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC) mapped an official burnt perimeter of 67,452 hectares, spread across 4 counties.

It is the largest fire in Georgia since 2016 (of 14 with a page). Number 8 in United States in 2017, of 619.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Baker · 2018Baker · 2018Baker · 2018Rare Ii · 2021

Burnt area
67,452ha
official perimeter (MTBS / NIFC)
Duration
≈ 47days
6 Apr 2017 – 22 May 2017
Counties hit
4
counties
Started on
6 Apr
2017
Heat detections
2,171
in a single hotspot: 411 MW
Danger at start
3
Very low · FWI index
Average daily power
1.0GW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 6 Apr22 May
22 May 2017

How it evolved, day by day

8 Apr 2017 · 107 MW · 3 9 Apr 2017 · 178 MW · 16 10 Apr 2017 · 515 MW · 20 11 Apr 2017 · 576 MW · 19 12 Apr 2017 · 60 MW · 5 13 Apr 2017 · 99 MW · 6 14 Apr 2017 · 495 MW · 44 15 Apr 2017 · 837 MW · 91 16 Apr 2017 · 436 MW · 81 17 Apr 2017 · 73 MW · 22 18 Apr 2017 · 33 MW · 20 19 Apr 2017 · 102 MW · 10 20 Apr 2017 · 177 MW · 13 21 Apr 2017 · 561 MW · 25 22 Apr 2017 · 517 MW · 43 23 Apr 2017 · 2,239 MW · 87 24 Apr 2017 · 464 MW · 18 25 Apr 2017 · 5,737 MW · 232 26 Apr 2017 · 2,004 MW · 103 27 Apr 2017 · 481 MW · 49 28 Apr 2017 · 2,794 MW · 170 29 Apr 2017 · 28 MW · 6 30 Apr 2017 · 293 MW · 19 1 May 2017 · 19 MW · 6 2 May 2017 · 4,346 MW · 68 3 May 2017 · 1,866 MW · 122 4 May 2017 · 40 MW · 32 5 May 2017 · 364 MW · 35 6 May 2017 · 6,693 MW · 268 7 May 2017 · 407 MW · 105 8 May 2017 · 1,295 MW · 69 9 May 2017 · 730 MW · 213 10 May 2017 · 712 MW · 36 11 May 2017 · 844 MW · 55 12 May 2017 · 1,111 MW · 55 13 May 2017 · 51 MW · 4 22 May 2017 · 1 MW · 1
8 Apr 14 Apr 20 Apr 26 Apr 2 May 6 May 8 May 22 May

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

The weather it burned in

34°high
67km/h · peak gust
16%lowest humidity

It had gone one day without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.6 mm on 23 May.

This area had burned before

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

How big is it?

10 km
It burned the equivalent of 43% of the area of London (675 km² against 1,583 km²).

London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).

This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.

What happened to each county

  1. Ware where it started
    35,137 ha reached on 9 Apr
    15 %
  2. Charlton
    20,638 ha reached on 26 Apr
    10 %
  3. Clinch
    8,028 ha reached on 14 Apr
    3.7 %
  4. Baker
    3,714 ha reached on 8 Apr
    2.4 %

Burnt area inside each county, from crossing the official 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 2015
Built-up area0.91 ha
Residents< 20

Inside the perimeter there were about 0.91 hectares of built-up land and almost nobody lived there (GHSL 2015, 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.

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)
6 Apr 23.7 °C 19 % 59 km/h 9.9 mm Very low 3
7 Apr 21.9 °C 16 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 13
8 Apr 22.9 °C 17 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 14
9 Apr 25.1 °C 27 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
10 Apr 27.0 °C 36 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
11 Apr 26.7 °C 38 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 15
12 Apr 27.1 °C 39 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
13 Apr 25.9 °C 42 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
14 Apr 26.3 °C 46 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
15 Apr 27.3 °C 39 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
16 Apr 27.4 °C 42 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 15
17 Apr 28.6 °C 37 % 28 km/h 0.1 mm Moderate 16
18 Apr 30.5 °C 30 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19
19 Apr 28.2 °C 33 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 21
20 Apr 29.6 °C 37 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
21 Apr 30.9 °C 27 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
22 Apr 29.2 °C 36 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
23 Apr 30.5 °C 42 % 35 km/h 0.2 mm Moderate 21
24 Apr 24.2 °C 35 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
25 Apr 27.5 °C 34 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
26 Apr 29.0 °C 35 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
27 Apr 32.2 °C 36 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
28 Apr 34.5 °C 36 % 39 km/h 0.2 mm High 25
29 Apr 33.0 °C 36 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
30 Apr 32.0 °C 40 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
1 May 32.3 °C 39 % 56 km/h 0.1 mm High 34
2 May 30.1 °C 16 % 32 km/h 0.3 mm High 34
3 May 32.0 °C 16 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
4 May 30.6 °C 41 % 55 km/h 5.8 mm Low 7
5 May 21.9 °C 34 % 67 km/h 0.1 mm High 22
6 May 25.4 °C 20 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
7 May 29.3 °C 24 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
8 May 29.5 °C 21 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
9 May 32.8 °C 20 % 16 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
10 May 34.2 °C 23 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
11 May 33.8 °C 20 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
12 May 32.5 °C 28 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
13 May 27.1 °C 64 % 55 km/h 10.1 mm Very low 3
14 May 29.2 °C 43 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Low 10
15 May 32.2 °C 30 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
16 May 33.2 °C 28 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
17 May 32.4 °C 39 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
18 May 31.2 °C 42 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
19 May 32.3 °C 43 % 36 km/h 0.5 mm High 26
20 May 33.5 °C 47 % 30 km/h 2.4 mm Low 10
21 May 30.8 °C 56 % 27 km/h 19.0 mm Very low 1
22 May 31.2 °C 55 % 30 km/h 6.9 mm Very low 1
23 May after 28.8 °C 64 % 63 km/h 1.6 mm Very low 4

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 30 Mar 2017
After · 29 May 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 · 2,171Every 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 United States ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the West Mims Fire last?
The official perimeter only gives the start date (6 April 2017). The end comes from the heat detections inside the perimeter: it burned until 22 May 2017 (47 days from 6 April 2017), the last day with detections before more than 10 days in a row without any, so it is approximate.
How much area did it burn?
The official perimeter published by United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC) is 67,452 hectares (674.5 km²). Other tallies, such as daily incident reports, may give slightly different figures.
Which counties burned?
The fire entered 4 counties: Ware (35,137 ha, 15 %); Charlton (20,638 ha, 10 %); Clinch (8,028 ha, 3.7 %); Baker (3,714 ha, 2.4 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 34.5 °C, humidity dropped to 16 % and gusts hit 67 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 39, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the official burnt perimeter of United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC, public domain), NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of United States. 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.

Emergency number: 911 · Emergency number and official warnings ›

Satellite cross-check

History of this page Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.

No changes since 24 October 2026.

RSS Changes to this page

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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How we know this
  • Perimeter: MTBS (US Geological Survey and US Forest Service), official.
  • The official perimeter has no end date: the end is the last day with VIIRS detections inside the perimeter before a gap of more than 10 days (150 days at most), so it is approximate. 2,171 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 2015, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.

How we build fire pages: methodology ›

Where this data comes from

The perimeter is official and in the public domain. For past years it comes from MTBS (Monitoring Trends in Burn Severity), run by the U.S. Geological Survey and the USDA Forest Service, which map it on Landsat and Sentinel-2 imagery. For the current and last year it comes from WFIGS at the National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC): incident perimeters mapped by fire crews, aircraft and imagery. Heat detections come from the VIIRS sensors aboard Suomi-NPP and NOAA-20, distributed by NASA FIRMS at 375 m resolution. County boundaries come from geoBoundaries ADM2 (Public Domain). The area per county is computed by WorldFires by crossing the perimeter with those boundaries, so it may differ slightly from official figures.