Yalinga fire, 7 January 2025 Yalinga
The fire started on 7 January 2025 in Yalinga, Central African Republic, and satellites saw it burning for 14 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 12,818 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 103th largest in Haute-Kotto since 2016 (of 372 with a page). Number 40 in Central African Republic in 2025, of 138.
Compare with…
- Burnt area
- 12,818ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 14days
- 7 Jan 2025 – 20 Jan 2025
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- sub-prefectures
- Started on
- 7 Jan
- 2025
- Heat detections
- 590
- in a single hotspot: 236 MW
- Danger at start
- 56
- Extreme · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 295MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
100% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 6,310 ha in 2016, 7,259 ha in 2017, 8,412 ha in 2018, 17,008 ha in 2020, 924 ha in 2021, 15,580 ha in 2022, 693 ha in 2023, 6,625 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 12,879 ha that had burned before.
- 8,619 ha Yalinga fire, December 2022 108,015 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 8,166 ha Yalinga fire, December 2018 136,358 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 7,418 ha Yalinga fire, January 2020 353,408 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 7,092 ha Yalinga fire, December 2017 26,411 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 4,820 ha Yalinga fire, January 2022 87,524 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 4,646 ha Yalinga fire, December 2020 979,715 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,673 ha Yalinga fire, January 2024 64,583 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,168 ha Yalinga fire, December 2016 6,735 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
Berlin boundary: geoBoundaries · Federal Agency for Cartography and Geodesy (dl-de/by-2-0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
Yalinga where it started12,903 ha reached on 7 Jan0.3 %
Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS 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 2025Inside the perimeter there was no noticeable built-up land and almost nobody lived there (GHSL 2025, 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. The GHSL 2025 epoch is a projection made from 2020 and earlier data.
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 7 Jan | 34.5 °C | 10 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 56 |
| 8 Jan | 34.4 °C | 10 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 53 |
| 9 Jan | 34.6 °C | 11 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 10 Jan | 35.2 °C | 12 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 54 |
| 11 Jan | 34.3 °C | 13 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 58 |
| 12 Jan | 33.8 °C | 12 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 59 |
| 13 Jan | 34.1 °C | 10 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 55 |
| 14 Jan | 35.0 °C | 11 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 54 |
| 15 Jan | 36.2 °C | 12 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 56 |
| 16 Jan | 36.4 °C | 12 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 58 |
| 17 Jan | 36.6 °C | 15 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 57 |
| 18 Jan | 37.5 °C | 14 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 55 |
| 19 Jan | 35.9 °C | 17 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 20 Jan | 35.2 °C | 19 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 21 Jan after | 35.5 °C | 16 % | 19 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 22 Jan after | 36.2 °C | 10 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 23 Jan after | 35.7 °C | 9 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 61 |
| 24 Jan after | 34.7 °C | 11 % | 43 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 60 |
| 25 Jan after | 34.6 °C | 9 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 55 |
| 26 Jan after | 34.8 °C | 9 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 57 |
| 27 Jan after | 34.6 °C | 9 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 58 |
| 28 Jan after | 34.6 °C | 9 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 55 |
| 29 Jan after | 33.3 °C | 10 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 57 |
| 30 Jan after | 34.0 °C | 10 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 57 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.
The smoke
CAMS · CopernicusOn 18 January 2025 the air beside the fire reached 130 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 72: 4.8 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
Particles from the Copernicus CAMS model at the centre of the perimeter; these are not measurements in each town. The pale bar is the worst hour, the solid one the daily average.
Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS)
Detections table · 590Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 87,524 haYalinga3 January 2022 · 33 days · 3 km away
- 108,015 haYalinga24 December 2022 · 36 days · 16 km away
- 979,715 haYalinga24 December 2020 · 76 days · 17 km away
- 109,809 haYalinga16 December 2018 · 48 days · 30 km away
- 140,621 haYalinga19 January 2022 · 25 days · 34 km away
- 353,408 haYalinga1 January 2020 · 52 days · 35 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Yalinga fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 7 January 2025 to 20 January 2025 (14 days). The perimeter dates it from 8 January 2025 to 19 January 2025.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 12,818 hectares (128.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Yalinga (12,903 ha, 0.3 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 37.5 °C, humidity dropped to 10 % and gusts hit 42 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 59, 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
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.
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
How we know this
- Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery.
- Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 8 January 2025 to 19 January 2025. 590 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 2025, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.
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.