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Caungula fire, 20 July 2016 Caungula

Out · last detection 26 Jul 2016, 12:05 UTC

The fire started on 20 July 2016 in Caungula, Angola, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 5,268 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 363th largest in Lunda Norte since 2016 (of 411 with a page). Number 122 in Angola in 2016, of 138.

Burnt area
5,268ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
7days
20 Jul 2016 – 26 Jul 2016
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
20 Jul
2016
Heat detections
178
in a single hotspot: 136 MW
Danger at start
50
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
4.0GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

26 Jul 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 20 Jul26 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

2022232526

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

The weather it burned in

31°high
44km/h · peak gust
15%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Caungula where it started
    5,302 ha reached on 20 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)
20 Jul 29.8 °C 16 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
21 Jul 29.8 °C 17 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
22 Jul 30.3 °C 17 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
23 Jul 30.8 °C 15 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
24 Jul 31.1 °C 17 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
25 Jul 30.5 °C 21 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
26 Jul 30.5 °C 22 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
27 Jul after 30.8 °C 23 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
28 Jul after 30.3 °C 32 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
29 Jul after 32.0 °C 25 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
30 Jul after 30.8 °C 26 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
31 Jul after 29.7 °C 31 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
1 Aug after 31.7 °C 22 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
2 Aug after 33.2 °C 12 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
3 Aug after 32.7 °C 12 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
4 Aug after 33.8 °C 9 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
5 Aug after 31.5 °C 11 % 57 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 64

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 13 Jul 2016
After · 2 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 · 178Every 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 Caungula fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 20 July 2016 and 26 July 2016: 7 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 5,268 hectares (52.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Caungula (5,302 ha, 0.5 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 31.1 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 44 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 50, 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.