What's going on in Sierra Leone?

[Karatakos]

All the air quality maps show a huge amount of emissions that seems to suggest a ton of stuff is burning. I can't find anything else about this on the internet. Is it forest fires? If so, why are the emissions greater than that of all major Chinese cities?

[idefix37]

@Karatakos
The high rate of pollution by NO2, CO and PM2.5 is probably due to wide scale fires.
Check with Active fires layer on Windy:

This article is 5 days old but confirms extensive fires in Sierra Leone

https://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/goddard/2019/agricultural-fires-and-smoke-across-guinea-and-sierra-leone

[moonfarms]

Farmers in most of tropical Africa use fire to clear bush land for crop planting, just before the start of the main rain season.