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Chipili fire, 25 August 2016 Chipili

Out · last detection 9 Sept 2016, 11:20 UTC

The fire started on 25 August 2016 in Chipili, Zambia, and satellites saw it burning for 15 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,742 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 284th largest in Luapula since 2016 (of 533 with a page). Number 105 in Zambia in 2016, of 246.

Burnt area
4,742ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
15days
25 Aug 2016 – 8 Sept 2016
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
25 Aug
2016
Heat detections
194
in a single hotspot: 44 MW
Danger at start
45
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
1.3GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

9 Sept 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 25 Aug8 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

25262728293113456789

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

The weather it burned in

33°high
51km/h · peak gust
18%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. Chipili where it started
    4,770 ha reached on 19 Aug
    1.1 %

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)
25 Aug 28.4 °C 27 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
26 Aug 28.2 °C 27 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
27 Aug 29.2 °C 24 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
28 Aug 29.1 °C 21 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
29 Aug 29.1 °C 19 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
30 Aug 29.1 °C 21 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
31 Aug 29.7 °C 19 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
1 Sept 28.8 °C 23 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
2 Sept 28.7 °C 22 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
3 Sept 30.1 °C 19 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
4 Sept 30.6 °C 21 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
5 Sept 31.7 °C 19 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
6 Sept 31.9 °C 19 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
7 Sept 32.1 °C 18 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
8 Sept 32.6 °C 20 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
9 Sept after 32.1 °C 21 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
10 Sept after 32.9 °C 15 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
11 Sept after 32.7 °C 16 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
12 Sept after 31.5 °C 17 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
13 Sept after 32.4 °C 16 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
14 Sept after 32.9 °C 16 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
15 Sept after 32.9 °C 18 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
16 Sept after 33.8 °C 19 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
17 Sept after 33.7 °C 19 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
18 Sept after 33.6 °C 23 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 18 Aug 2016
After · 15 Sept 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 · 194Every 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 Zambia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Chipili fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 25 August 2016 and 8 September 2016: 15 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 4,742 hectares (47.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Chipili (4,770 ha, 1.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 32.6 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 51 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 49, 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

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 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.