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Binga fire, 24 July 2026 Binga

Out · last detection 26 Jul 2026, 00:07 UTC

The fire started on 24 July 2026 in Binga, Zimbabwe, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 1,015 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 474th largest in Matabeleland North since 2016 (of 484 with a page). Number 351 in Zimbabwe in 2026, of 370.

The power measured by the satellite is low (21.5 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.

Burnt area
1,015ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
2days
24 Jul 2026 – 25 Jul 2026
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
24 Jul
2026
Heat detections
20
in a single hotspot: 22 MW
Danger at start
39
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
174MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

26 Jul 2026
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 24 Jul25 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

242526

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

The weather it burned in

28°high
44km/h · peak gust
21%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

58% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 325 ha in 2017, 275 ha in 2019.

What happened to each town

  1. Binga where it started
    1,020 ha reached on 24 Jul
    0.1 %

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)
24 Jul 28.1 °C 21 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
25 Jul 25.9 °C 28 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
26 Jul after 23.3 °C 31 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
27 Jul after 23.0 °C 32 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
28 Jul after 24.9 °C 28 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
29 Jul after 25.1 °C 30 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
30 Jul after 25.5 °C 25 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
31 Jul after 26.5 °C 17 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
1 Aug after 23.3 °C 29 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
2 Aug after 23.6 °C 30 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
3 Aug after 24.6 °C 26 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
4 Aug after 25.2 °C 24 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 34

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 17 Jul 2026
After · 1 Aug 2026

If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.

The smoke

CAMS · Copernicus

On 24 July 2026 the air beside the fire reached 42 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 28: 1.9 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak42 µg/m³
Days over the guideline4 days
PM1043 µg/m³
Optical depth0.35
22232425262728
Good Fair Moderate Poor Very poor Extremely poor

Particles from the Copernicus CAMS model at the centre of the perimeter; these are not measurements in each town. The pale bar is the worst hour, the solid one the daily average.

Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS)

Detections table · 20Every 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 Zimbabwe ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Binga fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 24 July 2026 and 25 July 2026: 2 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 1,015 hectares (10.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Binga (1,020 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 28.1 °C, humidity dropped to 21 % and gusts hit 44 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 46, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Zimbabwe (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.