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Cambulo fire, 18 July 2018 Cambulo

Out · last detection 26 Jul 2018, 23:22 UTC

The fire started on 18 July 2018 in Cambulo, Angola, and satellites saw it burning for 9 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 5,016 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 408th largest in Lunda Norte since 2016 (of 411 with a page). Number 98 in Angola in 2018, of 100.

Burnt area
5,016ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
9days
18 Jul 2018 – 26 Jul 2018
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
18 Jul
2018
Heat detections
149
in a single hotspot: 47 MW
Danger at start
47
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
1.1GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

26 Jul 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 18 Jul26 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

181920212223242526

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

The weather it burned in

33°high
46km/h · peak gust
13%lowest humidity

It had gone 58 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

72% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 3,523 ha in 2016, 470 ha in 2017. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,587 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Cambulo where it started
    5,054 ha reached on 18 Jul
    0.5 %

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)
18 Jul 29.3 °C 23 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
19 Jul 30.8 °C 22 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
20 Jul 31.5 °C 19 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
21 Jul 32.0 °C 14 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
22 Jul 32.3 °C 16 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
23 Jul 32.6 °C 15 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
24 Jul 30.9 °C 14 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
25 Jul 30.2 °C 14 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
26 Jul 31.5 °C 13 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
27 Jul after 32.1 °C 18 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
28 Jul after 32.1 °C 22 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
29 Jul after 32.1 °C 17 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
30 Jul after 32.7 °C 14 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
31 Jul after 32.2 °C 23 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
1 Aug after 30.2 °C 31 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
2 Aug after 31.5 °C 35 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
3 Aug after 31.7 °C 34 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
4 Aug after 32.8 °C 27 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
5 Aug after 33.8 °C 20 % 24 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 · 11 Jul 2018
After · 2 Aug 2018

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 · 149Every 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 Cambulo fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 18 July 2018 and 26 July 2018: 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 5,016 hectares (50.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Cambulo (5,054 ha, 0.5 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 32.6 °C, humidity dropped to 13 % and gusts hit 46 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 51, class Extreme.
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.