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Chimanimani fire, 2 October 2022 Chimanimani

Out · last detection 14 Oct 2022, 23:32 UTC

The fire started on 2 October 2022 in Chimanimani, Zimbabwe, and satellites saw it burning for 13 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,821 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 16th largest in Manicaland since 2016 (of 136 with a page). Number 57 in Zimbabwe in 2022, of 346.

Burnt area
2,821ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
13days
2 Oct 2022 – 14 Oct 2022
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
2 Oct
2022
Heat detections
121
in a single hotspot: 31 MW
Danger at start
22
High · FWI index
Energy released
795MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

14 Oct 2022
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 2 Oct14 Oct

How it evolved, day by day

24567891011121314

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

The weather it burned in

32°high
44km/h · peak gust
23%lowest humidity

It had gone 17 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 2.0 mm on 22 Oct.

This area had burned before

73% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,982 ha in 2016, 1,289 ha in 2019, 184 ha in 2020. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,059 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Chimanimani where it started
    2,733 ha reached on 2 Oct
    0.8 %

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)
2 Oct 27.7 °C 37 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
3 Oct 30.2 °C 31 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
4 Oct 31.9 °C 23 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
5 Oct 28.5 °C 41 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
6 Oct 30.9 °C 32 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
7 Oct 31.8 °C 23 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
8 Oct 26.1 °C 46 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
9 Oct 28.8 °C 34 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
10 Oct 28.0 °C 39 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
11 Oct 27.2 °C 44 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
12 Oct 29.9 °C 25 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
13 Oct 30.7 °C 27 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
14 Oct 30.8 °C 29 % 35 km/h 0.1 mm High 29
15 Oct after 28.0 °C 42 % 33 km/h 0.4 mm High 25
16 Oct after 27.5 °C 42 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
17 Oct after 27.7 °C 39 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
18 Oct after 27.8 °C 38 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
19 Oct after 25.7 °C 48 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
20 Oct after 27.3 °C 42 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
21 Oct after 28.6 °C 36 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
22 Oct after 28.3 °C 49 % 37 km/h 2.0 mm Low 9

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 25 Sept 2022
After · 21 Oct 2022

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 · 121Every 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 Chimanimani fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 2 October 2022 and 14 October 2022: 13 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 2,821 hectares (28.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Chimanimani (2,733 ha, 0.8 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 31.9 °C, humidity dropped to 23 % and gusts hit 44 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 32, class 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.