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CF · Central African Republic · →

Yalinga fire, 6 January 2018 Yalinga

Out · last detection 19 Jan 2018, 00:02 UTC

The fire started on 6 January 2018 in Yalinga, Central African Republic, and satellites saw it burning for 14 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 7,801 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 186th largest in Haute-Kotto since 2016 (of 372 with a page). Number 47 in Central African Republic in 2018, of 81.

Burnt area
7,801ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
14days
6 Jan 2018 – 19 Jan 2018
Municipalities hit
1
sub-prefectures
Started on
6 Jan
2018
Heat detections
257
in a single hotspot: 57 MW
Danger at start
47
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
2.1GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

19 Jan 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 6 Jan19 Jan

How it evolved, day by day

6789101112131415161719

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

The weather it burned in

36°high
38km/h · peak gust
9%lowest humidity

It had gone 47 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

71% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 5,973 ha in 2016, 220 ha in 2017. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 5,551 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Yalinga where it started
    7,845 ha reached on 6 Jan
    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)
6 Jan 32.2 °C 13 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
7 Jan 32.5 °C 12 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
8 Jan 32.9 °C 13 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
9 Jan 32.5 °C 14 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
10 Jan 33.4 °C 14 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
11 Jan 34.0 °C 14 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
12 Jan 34.9 °C 14 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
13 Jan 35.9 °C 12 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
14 Jan 35.3 °C 13 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
15 Jan 33.8 °C 15 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
16 Jan 34.3 °C 11 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
17 Jan 34.5 °C 9 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
18 Jan 34.2 °C 11 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
19 Jan 34.3 °C 12 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
20 Jan after 34.4 °C 12 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
21 Jan after 34.9 °C 11 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
22 Jan after 36.1 °C 11 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
23 Jan after 35.6 °C 10 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
24 Jan after 33.9 °C 10 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
25 Jan after 34.3 °C 10 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
26 Jan after 33.9 °C 12 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
27 Jan after 34.5 °C 13 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
28 Jan after 34.7 °C 11 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
29 Jan after 34.6 °C 10 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 30 Dec 2017
After · 26 Jan 2018

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 · 257Every 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 Yalinga fire last?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 6 January 2018 to 19 January 2018 (14 days). The perimeter dates it from 8 January 2018 to 17 January 2018.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 7,801 hectares (78.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Yalinga (7,845 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 35.9 °C, humidity dropped to 9 % and gusts hit 38 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 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.