How long did the Chinde fire last?

According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 18 August 2026 to 3 September 2026 (17 days). The perimeter dates it from 18 August 2026 to 27 August 2026.

How much area did it burn?

The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 3,682 hectares (36.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire only entered Chinde (3,696 ha, 1.2 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 30.7 °C, humidity dropped to 47 % and gusts hit 45 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 23, 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 · 2026-08-18 → 2026-09-03

Chinde fire, 18 August 2026 Chinde

Out · last detection 3 Sept 2026, 12:08 UTC

The fire started on 18 August 2026 in Chinde, Mozambique, and satellites saw it burning for 17 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,682 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 593th largest in Zambézia since 2016 (of 845 with a page). Number 357 in Mozambique in 2026, of 525.

The power measured by the satellite is low (24.0 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.

Burnt area: 3,682ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 17days; 18 Aug 2026 – 3 Sept 2026
Municipalities hit: 1; districts
Started on: 18 Aug; 2026
Heat detections: 86; in a single hotspot: 24 MW
Danger at start: 11; Low · FWI index
Energy released: 612MW; sum of detected power

Play back 3 Sept 2026

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 18 Aug3 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

1920212224252627293031123

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

45km/h · peak gust

47%lowest humidity

It had gone 2 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.7 mm on 8 Sept.

This area had burned before

42% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 599 ha in 2017, 511 ha in 2021, 641 ha in 2022, 604 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 1,554 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

Chinde where it started

3,696 ha reached on 19 Aug

1.2 %

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)
18 Aug	26.7 °C	61 %	33 km/h	0.6 mm	Low 11
19 Aug	28.3 °C	65 %	31 km/h	1.1 mm	Low 7
20 Aug	28.3 °C	64 %	30 km/h	0.2 mm	Low 10
21 Aug	29.9 °C	51 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 15
22 Aug	28.4 °C	59 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 15
23 Aug	28.9 °C	55 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 17
24 Aug	26.7 °C	63 %	45 km/h	1.5 mm	Low 9
25 Aug	27.2 °C	50 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 14
26 Aug	27.1 °C	54 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 16
27 Aug	26.8 °C	54 %	44 km/h	0.6 mm	Moderate 18
28 Aug	26.1 °C	61 %	39 km/h	1.7 mm	Low 9
29 Aug	27.3 °C	61 %	28 km/h	0.5 mm	Low 11
30 Aug	29.7 °C	56 %	36 km/h	0.2 mm	Moderate 17
31 Aug	30.4 °C	47 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	High 23
1 Sept	29.6 °C	55 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 21
2 Sept	29.9 °C	54 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 20
3 Sept	30.7 °C	48 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	High 23
4 Sept after	32.7 °C	33 %	44 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
5 Sept after	28.9 °C	58 %	44 km/h	0.0 mm	High 25
6 Sept after	29.7 °C	55 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	High 21
7 Sept after	28.8 °C	54 %	40 km/h	0.5 mm	High 24
8 Sept after	25.5 °C	54 %	49 km/h	1.7 mm	Moderate 14

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 11 Aug 2026

After · 10 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 22 August 2026 the air beside the fire reached 84 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 51: 3.4 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak84 µg/m³

Days over the guideline8 days

PM1088 µg/m³

Optical depth0.72

WHO 15

16171819202122232425262728293031123456

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 · 86Every 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 Chinde fire last?: According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 18 August 2026 to 3 September 2026 (17 days). The perimeter dates it from 18 August 2026 to 27 August 2026.
How much area did it burn?: The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 3,682 hectares (36.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire only entered Chinde (3,696 ha, 1.2 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 30.7 °C, humidity dropped to 47 % and gusts hit 45 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 23, 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 ↗

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.

Where it burned