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Yéngou fire, January 2022 Yéngou, Samba-Boungou

Out · last detection 30 Jan 2022, 23:43 UTC

The fire started on 17 January 2022 in Yéngou, Central African Republic, and satellites saw it burning for 13 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 5,327 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 30th largest in Ouaka since 2016 (of 34 with a page). Number 95 in Central African Republic in 2022, of 98.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Samba-Boungou · 2016Yéngou · 2021Yéngou · 2024Mbolo-Pata · 2022

Burnt area
5,327ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
13days
17 Jan 2022 – 29 Jan 2022
Municipalities hit
2
sub-prefectures
Started on
17 Jan
2022
Heat detections
180
in a single hotspot: 30 MW
Danger at start
52
Extreme · FWI index
Average daily power
62MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 17 Jan29 Jan
30 Jan 2022

How it evolved, day by day

17 Jan 2022 · 48 MW · 10 18 Jan 2022 · 58 MW · 10 19 Jan 2022 · 6 MW · 8 20 Jan 2022 · 61 MW · 26 21 Jan 2022 · 207 MW · 36 22 Jan 2022 · 100 MW · 28 23 Jan 2022 · 226 MW · 20 24 Jan 2022 · 16 MW · 10 25 Jan 2022 · 2 MW · 3 26 Jan 2022 · 22 MW · 5 27 Jan 2022 · 22 MW · 4 28 Jan 2022 · 17 MW · 4 29 Jan 2022 · 74 MW · 7 30 Jan 2022 · 17 MW · 9
17 Jan 19 Jan 21 Jan 23 Jan 25 Jan 27 Jan 29 Jan

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
39km/h · peak gust
12%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

96% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 3,299 ha in 2016, 11 ha in 2017, 1,565 ha in 2018, 2,752 ha in 2019, 2,625 ha in 2020, 2,739 ha in 2021. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 5,088 ha that had burned before.

How big is it?

10 km
It burned the equivalent of 3.4% of the area of London (53 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 town

  1. Yéngou where it started
    5,367 ha reached on 17 Jan
    0.5 %
  2. Samba-Boungou
    5 ha
    0.0 %

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)
17 Jan 33.4 °C 12 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
18 Jan 33.3 °C 13 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
19 Jan 34.1 °C 14 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
20 Jan 34.2 °C 13 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
21 Jan 34.9 °C 13 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
22 Jan 36.1 °C 15 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
23 Jan 35.9 °C 15 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
24 Jan 36.1 °C 15 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
25 Jan 36.4 °C 14 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
26 Jan 36.4 °C 13 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
27 Jan 35.7 °C 13 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
28 Jan 35.0 °C 13 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
29 Jan 34.7 °C 12 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
30 Jan after 35.2 °C 11 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
31 Jan after 35.0 °C 11 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
1 Feb after 34.5 °C 11 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
2 Feb after 34.8 °C 13 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
3 Feb after 35.7 °C 11 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
4 Feb after 36.3 °C 7 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
5 Feb after 35.0 °C 12 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
6 Feb after 35.2 °C 11 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
7 Feb after 35.6 °C 9 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
8 Feb after 36.4 °C 9 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 59

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 10 Jan 2022
After · 5 Feb 2022

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 · 180Every 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 Yéngou fire last?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 17 January 2022 to 29 January 2022 (13 days). The perimeter dates it from 17 January 2022 to 27 January 2022.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 5,327 hectares (53.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Yéngou (5,367 ha, 0.5 %); Samba-Boungou (5 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 36.4 °C, humidity dropped to 12 % and gusts hit 39 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 58, 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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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 17 January 2022 to 27 January 2022. 180 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.

How we build fire pages: methodology ›

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.