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Chipili fire, 26 July 2024 Chipili, Lupososhi, Kawambwa

Out · last detection 16 Aug 2024, 12:23 UTC

The fire started on 26 July 2024 in Chipili, Zambia, and satellites saw it burning for 21 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 36,195 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.

It is the 31th largest in Luapula since 2016 (of 533 with a page). Number 4 in Zambia in 2024, of 160.

Burnt area
36,195ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
21days
26 Jul 2024 – 15 Aug 2024
Municipalities hit
3
districts
Started on
26 Jul
2024
Heat detections
1,682
in a single hotspot: 96 MW
Danger at start
41
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
18.6GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

16 Aug 2024
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 26 Jul15 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

29303112345678910111213141516

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
46km/h · peak gust
16%lowest humidity

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: 22,421 ha in 2016, 22,773 ha in 2017, 19,483 ha in 2018, 20,432 ha in 2019, 13,219 ha in 2020, 20,492 ha in 2021, 20,022 ha in 2022, 20,088 ha in 2023. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 35,852 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Chipili where it started
    18,917 ha reached on 20 Jul
    4.4 %
  2. Lupososhi
    16,679 ha reached on 30 Jul
    4.0 %
  3. Kawambwa
    808 ha reached on 2 Aug
    0.1 %

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)
26 Jul 27.6 °C 16 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
27 Jul 27.5 °C 17 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
28 Jul 27.5 °C 18 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
29 Jul 28.8 °C 17 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
30 Jul 29.3 °C 18 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
31 Jul 28.6 °C 19 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
1 Aug 27.3 °C 23 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
2 Aug 27.3 °C 27 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
3 Aug 27.9 °C 30 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
4 Aug 29.0 °C 21 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
5 Aug 30.6 °C 18 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
6 Aug 29.0 °C 19 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
7 Aug 28.1 °C 22 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
8 Aug 28.8 °C 24 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
9 Aug 28.6 °C 24 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
10 Aug 28.7 °C 23 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
11 Aug 28.9 °C 26 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
12 Aug 28.6 °C 23 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
13 Aug 28.7 °C 23 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
14 Aug 29.8 °C 27 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
15 Aug 30.4 °C 19 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
16 Aug after 27.6 °C 30 % 56 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
17 Aug after 26.8 °C 30 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
18 Aug after 27.8 °C 27 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
19 Aug after 27.8 °C 24 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
20 Aug after 27.3 °C 27 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
21 Aug after 26.9 °C 27 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
22 Aug after 27.3 °C 25 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
23 Aug after 26.8 °C 26 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
24 Aug after 27.3 °C 28 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
25 Aug after 27.0 °C 26 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 19 Jul 2024
After · 22 Aug 2024

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 1 August 2024 the air beside the fire reached 44 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 29: 1.9 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak44 µg/m³
Days over the guideline25 days
PM1063 µg/m³
Optical depth0.87
2425262728293031123456789101112131415161718
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 · 1,682Every 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 26 July 2024 and 15 August 2024: 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 36,195 hectares (362.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 3 municipalities: Chipili (18,917 ha, 4.4 %); Lupososhi (16,679 ha, 4.0 %); Kawambwa (808 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 30.6 °C, humidity dropped to 16 % and gusts hit 46 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 46, 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.