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Yorro fire, December 2018 Yorro, Lau

Out · last detection 21 Dec 2018, 12:48 UTC

The fire started on 16 December 2018 in Yorro, Nigeria, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 5,457 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 19th largest in Taraba since 2016 (of 160 with a page). Number 4 in Nigeria in 2018, of 63.

Burnt area
5,457ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
5days
16 Dec 2018 – 20 Dec 2018
Municipalities hit
2
local government areas
Started on
16 Dec
2018
Heat detections
171
in a single hotspot: 61 MW
Danger at start
40
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
698MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

21 Dec 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 16 Dec20 Dec

How it evolved, day by day

161718192021

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
35km/h · peak gust
12%lowest humidity

It had gone 39 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

25% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 502 ha in 2016, 1,325 ha in 2017. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 1,369 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Yorro where it started
    5,153 ha reached on 16 Dec
    4.4 %
  2. Lau
    342 ha reached on 17 Dec
    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)
16 Dec 34.1 °C 12 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
17 Dec 31.6 °C 12 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
18 Dec 30.4 °C 17 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
19 Dec 30.5 °C 17 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
20 Dec 31.3 °C 17 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
21 Dec after 30.1 °C 19 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
22 Dec after 30.2 °C 17 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
23 Dec after 30.4 °C 16 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
24 Dec after 29.0 °C 19 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
25 Dec after 29.6 °C 19 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
26 Dec after 30.0 °C 21 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
27 Dec after 30.9 °C 21 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
28 Dec after 31.0 °C 20 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
29 Dec after 30.1 °C 21 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
30 Dec after 30.5 °C 19 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 9 Dec 2018
After · 27 Dec 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 · 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 Nigeria ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Yorro fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 16 December 2018 and 20 December 2018: 5 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 5,457 hectares (54.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Yorro (5,153 ha, 4.4 %); Lau (342 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 34.1 °C, humidity dropped to 12 % and gusts hit 35 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 42, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Nigeria (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.

Emergency number: 112

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.

Report an error
What do you think is wrong?

We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy. This is not an emergency service: if there is a fire now, call 112.

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 ADM2 (Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)). 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.