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Bariadi fire, July 2023 Bariadi

Out · last detection 21 Jul 2023, 22:37 UTC

The fire started on 15 July 2023 in Bariadi, Tanzania, and satellites saw it burning for 6 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,201 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 62th largest in Simiyu since 2016 (of 68 with a page). Number 37 in Tanzania in 2023, of 44.

Burnt area
3,201ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
6days
15 Jul 2023 – 20 Jul 2023
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
15 Jul
2023
Heat detections
181
in a single hotspot: 166 MW
Danger at start
41
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
2.3GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

21 Jul 2023
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 15 Jul20 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

15161718192021

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

The weather it burned in

32°high
39km/h · peak gust
13%lowest humidity

It had gone 28 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

91% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,220 ha in 2016, 122 ha in 2018, 1,940 ha in 2020, 388 ha in 2021, 124 ha in 2022. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,913 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Bariadi where it started
    3,222 ha reached on 14 Jul
    0.6 %

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)
15 Jul 29.9 °C 22 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
16 Jul 29.9 °C 23 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
17 Jul 28.8 °C 25 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
18 Jul 28.3 °C 27 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
19 Jul 29.7 °C 22 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
20 Jul 31.6 °C 13 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
21 Jul after 29.9 °C 17 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
22 Jul after 29.7 °C 25 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
23 Jul after 30.1 °C 25 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
24 Jul after 28.1 °C 30 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
25 Jul after 29.6 °C 27 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
26 Jul after 29.7 °C 20 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
27 Jul after 30.9 °C 24 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
28 Jul after 27.8 °C 33 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
29 Jul after 29.8 °C 30 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
30 Jul after 31.2 °C 23 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 36

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 8 Jul 2023
After · 27 Jul 2023

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 · 181Every 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 Tanzania ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Bariadi fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 15 July 2023 and 20 July 2023: 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 3,201 hectares (32.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Bariadi (3,222 ha, 0.6 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 31.6 °C, humidity dropped to 13 % and gusts hit 39 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 44, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Tanzania (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 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.