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Balama fire, 19 July 2016 Balama

Out · last detection 31 Jul 2016, 10:29 UTC

The fire started on 19 July 2016 in Balama, Mozambique, and satellites saw it burning for 12 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 5,455 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 26th largest in Cabo Delgado since 2016 (of 120 with a page). Number 71 in Mozambique in 2016, of 194.

Burnt area
5,455ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
12days
19 Jul 2016 – 30 Jul 2016
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
19 Jul
2016
Heat detections
176
in a single hotspot: 49 MW
Danger at start
30
High · FWI index
Energy released
1.4GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

31 Jul 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 19 Jul30 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

19202122232425262728293031

Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.

The weather it burned in

30°high
42km/h · peak gust
30%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 2.6 mm on 7 Aug.

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

  1. Balama where it started
    5,481 ha reached on 17 Jul
    1.0 %

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)
19 Jul 26.8 °C 33 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
20 Jul 25.1 °C 47 % 42 km/h 0.3 mm High 32
21 Jul 27.7 °C 34 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
22 Jul 27.8 °C 30 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
23 Jul 28.3 °C 36 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
24 Jul 27.8 °C 43 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
25 Jul 27.1 °C 45 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
26 Jul 28.2 °C 40 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
27 Jul 28.0 °C 38 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
28 Jul 27.5 °C 48 % 22 km/h 0.2 mm High 26
29 Jul 29.9 °C 32 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
30 Jul 28.1 °C 33 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
31 Jul after 28.4 °C 29 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
1 Aug after 27.0 °C 36 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
2 Aug after 26.9 °C 39 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
3 Aug after 26.7 °C 41 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
4 Aug after 26.8 °C 42 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
5 Aug after 25.8 °C 32 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
6 Aug after 26.3 °C 42 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
7 Aug after 23.1 °C 56 % 38 km/h 2.6 mm Low 9

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 12 Jul 2016
After · 6 Aug 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 · 176Every 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 Mozambique ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Balama fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 19 July 2016 and 30 July 2016: 12 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 5,455 hectares (54.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Balama (5,481 ha, 1.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 29.9 °C, humidity dropped to 30 % and gusts hit 42 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 32, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Mozambique (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 ADM2 (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.