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Cacuso fire, June 2020 Cacuso

Out · last detection 22 Jun 2020, 23:53 UTC

The fire started on 13 June 2020 in Cacuso, Angola, and satellites saw it burning for 9 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 5,301 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 107th largest in Malanje since 2016 (of 127 with a page). Number 103 in Angola in 2020, of 123.

Burnt area
5,301ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
9days
13 Jun 2020 – 21 Jun 2020
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
13 Jun
2020
Heat detections
256
in a single hotspot: 109 MW
Danger at start
33
High · FWI index
Energy released
2.5GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

22 Jun 2020
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 13 Jun21 Jun

How it evolved, day by day

13141516171819202122

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
47km/h · peak gust
20%lowest humidity

It had gone 38 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

54% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,974 ha in 2016, 1,039 ha in 2017, 827 ha in 2018, 1,087 ha in 2019. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,857 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Cacuso where it started
    5,335 ha reached on 6 Jun
    0.9 %

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)
13 Jun 29.6 °C 29 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
14 Jun 30.0 °C 26 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
15 Jun 30.0 °C 27 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
16 Jun 30.2 °C 29 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
17 Jun 28.9 °C 31 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
18 Jun 27.5 °C 30 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
19 Jun 28.4 °C 31 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
20 Jun 29.1 °C 25 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
21 Jun 29.6 °C 20 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
22 Jun after 29.4 °C 24 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
23 Jun after 29.8 °C 22 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
24 Jun after 31.0 °C 29 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
25 Jun after 30.1 °C 24 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
26 Jun after 30.9 °C 23 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
27 Jun after 29.1 °C 32 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
28 Jun after 30.4 °C 24 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
29 Jun after 31.6 °C 26 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
30 Jun after 30.7 °C 23 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
1 Jul after 30.9 °C 28 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 6 Jun 2020
After · 28 Jun 2020

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 · 256Every 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 Angola ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Cacuso fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 13 June 2020 and 21 June 2020: 9 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 5,301 hectares (53.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Cacuso (5,335 ha, 0.9 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 30.2 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 47 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 39, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Angola (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 (Public Domain). 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.