How long did the Chama fire last?

According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 11 September 2026 to 23 September 2026 (13 days). The perimeter dates it from 11 September 2026 to 17 September 2026.

How much area did it burn?

The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 3,209 hectares (32.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire only entered Chama (3,224 ha, 0.2 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 35.6 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 44 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 43, class Very high.

Where does this data come from?

From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Zambia (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

ZM · Zambia · 2026-09-11 → 2026-09-23

Chama fire, 11 September 2026 Chama

Out · last detection 23 Sept 2026, 10:53 UTC

The fire started on 11 September 2026 in Chama, Zambia, and satellites saw it burning for 13 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,209 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 459th largest in Muchinga since 2016 (of 513 with a page). Number 524 in Zambia in 2026, of 604.

Burnt area: 3,209ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 13days; 11 Sept 2026 – 23 Sept 2026
Municipalities hit: 1; districts
Started on: 11 Sept; 2026
Heat detections: 42; in a single hotspot: 44 MW
Danger at start: 35; High · FWI index
Energy released: 455MW; sum of detected power

Play back 23 Sept 2026

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 11 Sept23 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

1113141516172023

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

The weather it burned in

36°high

44km/h · peak gust

20%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 2.9 mm on 2 Oct.

This area had burned before

47% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 856 ha in 2016, 860 ha in 2017, 1,231 ha in 2019. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 1,523 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

Chama where it started

3,224 ha reached on 11 Sept

0.2 %

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)
11 Sept	33.6 °C	29 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
12 Sept	34.4 °C	24 %	25 km/h	0.0 mm	High 38
13 Sept	34.6 °C	23 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
14 Sept	34.6 °C	27 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
15 Sept	34.9 °C	25 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
16 Sept	34.9 °C	21 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38
17 Sept	34.3 °C	20 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
18 Sept	34.0 °C	26 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
19 Sept	35.3 °C	26 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
20 Sept	35.2 °C	26 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
21 Sept	35.6 °C	29 %	25 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
22 Sept	35.0 °C	31 %	44 km/h	1.9 mm	High 33
23 Sept	34.3 °C	35 %	32 km/h	0.6 mm	High 30
24 Sept after	35.4 °C	26 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	High 38
25 Sept after	35.4 °C	26 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	High 38
26 Sept after	36.7 °C	24 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
27 Sept after	37.1 °C	21 %	20 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
28 Sept after	38.2 °C	18 %	19 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 41
29 Sept after	37.3 °C	21 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 47
30 Sept after	34.7 °C	25 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 45
1 Oct after	33.4 °C	32 %	22 km/h	0.1 mm	High 35
2 Oct after	31.2 °C	44 %	32 km/h	2.9 mm	Moderate 12

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 4 Sept 2026

After · 30 Sept 2026

Before After

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 17 September 2026 the air beside the fire reached 65 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 30: 2.0 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak65 µg/m³

Days over the guideline17 days

PM1068 µg/m³

Optical depth0.60

WHO 15

91011121314151617181920212223242526

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 · 42Every 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 time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Zambia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Chama fire last?: According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 11 September 2026 to 23 September 2026 (13 days). The perimeter dates it from 11 September 2026 to 17 September 2026.
How much area did it burn?: The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 3,209 hectares (32.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire only entered Chama (3,224 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 35.6 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 44 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 43, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?: From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Zambia (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

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · Copernicus ↗

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?

Dates or duration Place or towns Burned area Name It was not a wildfire Same fire as another page Something else

What really happened?

Your connection to the fire (optional) Email (optional)

We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy.

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 4.0 (CC BY 4.0)). 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.

Where it burned