Chipili fire, 20 August 2023 Mansa, Chipili
The fire started on 20 August 2023 in Chipili, Zambia, and satellites saw it burning for 21 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 17,920 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.
It is the 85th largest in Luapula since 2016 (of 533 with a page). Number 5 in Zambia in 2023, of 165.
Compare with…
Suggestions: Mansa · 2016Mansa · 2021Chipili · 2019Mansa · 2017
- Burnt area
- 17,920ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 21days
- 20 Aug 2023 – 9 Sept 2023
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- districts
- Started on
- 20 Aug
- 2023
- Heat detections
- 1,158
- in a single hotspot: 119 MW
- Danger at start
- 38
- High · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 645MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
99% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 12,513 ha in 2016, 9,282 ha in 2017, 10,046 ha in 2018, 11,592 ha in 2019, 5,869 ha in 2020, 8,556 ha in 2021, 8,907 ha in 2022. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 17,673 ha that had burned before.
- 10,260 ha Mansa fire, August 2016 80,978 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 8,132 ha Mansa fire, August 2021 259,734 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 7,610 ha Chipili fire, August 2019 32,366 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 6,715 ha Mansa fire, August 2017 258,414 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 6,272 ha Mansa fire, August 2018 83,277 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 5,208 ha Mansa fire, August 2020 280,384 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 4,220 ha Mansa fire, August 2022 185,598 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,738 ha Mansa fire, September 2022 5,056 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
Berlin boundary: geoBoundaries · Federal Agency for Cartography and Geodesy (dl-de/by-2-0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
14,051 ha reached on 21 Aug1.8 %
-
Chipili where it started3,968 ha reached on 20 Aug0.9 %
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.
People and buildings inside the perimeter
GHSL 2025Inside the perimeter there were about 15 hectares of built-up land and about 4,500 residents (GHSL 2025, satellite-based estimate).
This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned. The GHSL 2025 epoch is a projection made from 2020 and earlier data.
Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 20 Aug | 31.2 °C | 27 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 38 |
| 21 Aug | 31.5 °C | 28 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 22 Aug | 32.0 °C | 23 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 23 Aug | 31.3 °C | 19 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 24 Aug | 31.5 °C | 19 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 25 Aug | 31.5 °C | 26 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 26 Aug | 32.7 °C | 22 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 27 Aug | 31.9 °C | 15 % | 54 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 57 |
| 28 Aug | 25.5 °C | 37 % | 72 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 54 |
| 29 Aug | 23.2 °C | 45 % | 56 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 30 Aug | 26.4 °C | 34 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 31 Aug | 28.5 °C | 32 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 1 Sept | 29.5 °C | 30 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 38 |
| 2 Sept | 30.0 °C | 23 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 3 Sept | 31.0 °C | 24 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 4 Sept | 29.9 °C | 25 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 5 Sept | 30.7 °C | 25 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 6 Sept | 31.7 °C | 27 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 7 Sept | 31.7 °C | 23 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 8 Sept | 30.9 °C | 24 % | 48 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 9 Sept | 30.6 °C | 21 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 10 Sept after | 30.4 °C | 24 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 11 Sept after | 32.2 °C | 25 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 12 Sept after | 32.6 °C | 25 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 13 Sept after | 30.4 °C | 31 % | 65 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 56 |
| 14 Sept after | 29.4 °C | 31 % | 57 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 50 |
| 15 Sept after | 30.6 °C | 29 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 16 Sept after | 32.5 °C | 24 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 17 Sept after | 33.0 °C | 21 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 18 Sept after | 32.1 °C | 18 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 19 Sept after | 31.4 °C | 24 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
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 · CopernicusOn 6 September 2023 the air beside the fire reached 96 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 58: 3.9 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
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 · 1,158Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 185,598 haMansa21 August 2022 · 28 days · 18 km away
- 258,414 haMansa21 August 2017 · 34 days · 22 km away
- 296,161 haMansa15 August 2025 · 37 days · 26 km away
- 83,277 haMansa27 August 2018 · 19 days · 26 km away
- 259,734 haMansa24 August 2021 · 22 days · 36 km away
- 156,557 haLupososhi25 July 2026 · 65 days · 40 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Chipili fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 20 August 2023 and 9 September 2023: 21 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 17,920 hectares (179.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Mansa (14,051 ha, 1.8 %); Chipili (3,968 ha, 0.9 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 32.7 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 72 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 57, class Extreme.
- 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
History of this page Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
No changes since 24 October 2026.
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
How we know this
- Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery; 3 polygons grouped in this page.
- Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 1,158 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
- We have not matched this page with any official record.
- Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
- Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2025, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.
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.