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Yaso fire, 7 December 2016 Yaso

Out · last detection 12 Dec 2016, 22:58 UTC

The fire started on 7 December 2016 in Yaso, Ethiopia, and satellites saw it burning for 6 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,255 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 52th largest in Oromia since 2016 (of 264 with a page). Number 83 in Ethiopia in 2016, of 309.

Burnt area
4,255ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
6days
7 Dec 2016 – 12 Dec 2016
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
7 Dec
2016
Heat detections
134
in a single hotspot: 60 MW
Danger at start
38
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
1.0GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

12 Dec 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 7 Dec12 Dec

How it evolved, day by day

789101112

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
36km/h · peak gust
19%lowest humidity

It had gone 41 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. Yaso where it started
    4,286 ha reached on 6 Dec
    1.6 %

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)
7 Dec 33.2 °C 20 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
8 Dec 33.6 °C 19 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
9 Dec 32.9 °C 26 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
10 Dec 33.3 °C 26 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
11 Dec 33.7 °C 25 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
12 Dec 33.7 °C 28 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
13 Dec after 33.7 °C 26 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
14 Dec after 34.4 °C 26 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
15 Dec after 34.2 °C 23 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
16 Dec after 33.1 °C 28 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
17 Dec after 32.3 °C 30 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
18 Dec after 33.5 °C 28 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
19 Dec after 32.6 °C 20 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
20 Dec after 33.2 °C 22 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
21 Dec after 32.7 °C 30 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
22 Dec after 34.4 °C 25 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 35

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 30 Nov 2016
After · 19 Dec 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 · 134Every 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 Ethiopia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Yaso fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 7 December 2016 and 12 December 2016: 6 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 4,255 hectares (42.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Yaso (4,286 ha, 1.6 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 33.7 °C, humidity dropped to 19 % and gusts hit 36 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 39, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Ethiopia (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 (Open Data Commons Open Database License 1.0). 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.