How long did the Muembe fire last?

According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 5 October 2026 to 30 October 2026 (26 days). The perimeter dates it from 5 October 2026 to 29 October 2026.

How much area did it burn?

The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 71,529 hectares (715.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 3 municipalities: Muembe (59,099 ha, 10 %); Chimbonila (10,732 ha, 2.0 %); Majune (2,197 ha, 0.2 %).

Is the Muembe fire still active?

Yes: satellites detected fire on 30 Oct 2026, 11:00 UTC. Check the emergency service for the official status.

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 33.7 °C, humidity dropped to 17 % and gusts hit 47 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 36, class High.

Where does this data come from?

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

MZ · Mozambique · 2026-10-05 → 2026-10-30

Muembe fire, 5 October 2026 Muembe, Chimbonila, Majune

Burning · last detection 30 Oct 2026, 11:00 UTC

The fire started on 5 October 2026 in Muembe, Mozambique, and satellites saw it burning for 26 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 71,529 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.

It is the largest fire in Niassa since 2016 (of 589 with a page). Number 15 in Mozambique in 2026, of 547.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Muembe · 2025 Muembe · 2022 Muembe · 2025 Muembe · 2017

Is it still active?

Satellites detected fire on 30 Oct 2026, 11:00 UTC. Everything suggests it is still burning. Satellites pass a few times a day and cloud or smoke can hide the fire: a lack of detections is not an official extinction. Each country’s emergency service declares a fire contained or out.

Burnt area: 71,529ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 26days; 5 Oct 2026 – 30 Oct 2026
Municipalities hit: 3; districts
Started on: 5 Oct; 2026
Heat detections: 1,462; in a single hotspot: 113 MW
Danger at start: 2; Very low · FWI index
Average daily power: 570MW; detected power per day, on average

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 5 Oct30 Oct

Play back 30 Oct 2026

How it evolved, day by day

5 Oct 9 Oct 14 Oct 18 Oct 22 Oct 26 Oct 30 Oct

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

The weather it burned in

34°high

47km/h · peak gust

17%lowest humidity

It had gone 0 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

4% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 148 ha in 2016, 342 ha in 2021, 70 ha in 2022, 68 ha in 2023, 1,097 ha in 2024, 2,496 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,831 ha that had burned before.

2,163 ha Muembe fire, October 2025 3,189 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire

How big is it?

It burned the equivalent of 45% of the area of London (715 km² against 1,583 km²).

London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).

This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.

What happened to each town

Muembe where it started

59,099 ha reached on 5 Oct

10 %
Chimbonila

10,732 ha reached on 6 Oct

2.0 %
Majune

2,197 ha reached on 6 Oct

0.2 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area 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) · forecast models, provisional until the ERA5 reanalysis arrives

Day	High	Min. humidity	Peak gust	Rain	Danger (FWI)
5 Oct	25.6 °C	49 %	40 km/h	3.2 mm	Very low 2
6 Oct	26.7 °C	41 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	Low 7
7 Oct	27.5 °C	38 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 12
8 Oct	28.8 °C	32 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 15
9 Oct	27.8 °C	36 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 16
10 Oct	27.1 °C	41 %	40 km/h	1.0 mm	Low 11
11 Oct	27.6 °C	38 %	33 km/h	1.2 mm	Low 9
12 Oct	27.6 °C	36 %	39 km/h	0.5 mm	Moderate 16
13 Oct	27.4 °C	38 %	41 km/h	0.9 mm	Moderate 14
14 Oct	28.0 °C	34 %	40 km/h	0.1 mm	Moderate 18
15 Oct	27.4 °C	31 %	47 km/h	0.1 mm	Moderate 21
16 Oct	26.2 °C	32 %	44 km/h	0.2 mm	High 23
17 Oct	26.8 °C	36 %	40 km/h	0.3 mm	High 22
18 Oct	26.9 °C	35 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	High 22
19 Oct	27.7 °C	40 %	38 km/h	0.8 mm	Moderate 17
20 Oct	32.0 °C	27 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	High 24
21 Oct	31.5 °C	26 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	High 26
22 Oct	33.7 °C	17 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
23 Oct	33.7 °C	20 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
24 Oct	30.4 °C	29 %	46 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
25 Oct	28.6 °C	40 %	38 km/h	2.0 mm	Moderate 12
26 Oct	29.8 °C	34 %	38 km/h	0.5 mm	Moderate 21
27 Oct	29.4 °C	34 %	35 km/h	0.1 mm	High 24
28 Oct	31.1 °C	27 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	High 29
29 Oct	31.0 °C	29 %	33 km/h	0.1 mm	High 29
30 Oct	26.5 °C	42 %	33 km/h	1.6 mm	Moderate 13

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 28 Sept 2026

After · 29 Oct 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 10 October 2026 the air beside the fire reached 63 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 33: 2.2 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak63 µg/m³

Days over the guideline6 days

PM1066 µg/m³

Optical depth0.66

WHO 15

34567891011121314151617

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 · 1,462Every 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 Mozambique ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Muembe fire last?: According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 5 October 2026 to 30 October 2026 (26 days). The perimeter dates it from 5 October 2026 to 29 October 2026.
How much area did it burn?: The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 71,529 hectares (715.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 3 municipalities: Muembe (59,099 ha, 10 %); Chimbonila (10,732 ha, 2.0 %); Majune (2,197 ha, 0.2 %).
Is the Muembe fire still active?: Yes: satellites detected fire on 30 Oct 2026, 11:00 UTC. Check the emergency service for the official status.
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 33.7 °C, humidity dropped to 17 % and gusts hit 47 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 36, class High.
Where does this data come from?: From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Mozambique (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 ↗

History of this page · 5 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.

30 October 2026 Area: 67,220 → 71,529 ha.
27 October 2026 Area: 16,645 → 67,220 ha.
27 October 2026 The page “Muembe, 5 October 2026” has been merged into this one: it was the same fire.
25 October 2026 Area: 4,754 → 16,645 ha.
25 October 2026 The page “Chimbonila, 5 October 2026” has been merged into this one: it was the same fire.

RSS Changes to this page

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.

How we know this

Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery; 7 polygons grouped in this page.
Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 5 October 2026 to 29 October 2026. 1,462 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
We have not matched this page with any official record.
Weather: ECMWF IFS model, provisional until the ERA5 reanalysis arrives.

How we build fire pages: methodology ›

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.