How long did the Chipili fire last?

GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 9 August 2025 and 9 September 2025: 32 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 110,204 hectares (1,102.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 3 municipalities: Chipili (54,519 ha, 13 %); Kawambwa (51,775 ha, 6.4 %); Lupososhi (4,605 ha, 1.1 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 32.0 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 50 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.

ZM · Zambia · 2025-08-09 → 2025-09-09

Chipili fire, 9 August 2025 Chipili, Kawambwa, Lupososhi

Out · last detection 10 Sept 2025, 12:13 UTC

The fire started on 9 August 2025 in Chipili, Zambia, and satellites saw it burning for 32 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 110,204 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.

This page is probably a fire complex, not a single fire. GWIS merges into one perimeter the fires that touch over weeks, which in large burning seasons can join dozens of separate fires. The total area is reliable; the origin and dates refer to the whole complex.

Other fire pages in the same area and on the same dates:

It is the 15th largest in Luapula since 2016 (of 533 with a page). Number 6 in Zambia in 2025, of 271.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Chipili · 2019 Kawambwa · 2017 Chipili · 2020 Chipili · 2021

Burnt area: 110,204ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 32days; 9 Aug 2025 – 9 Sept 2025
Municipalities hit: 3; districts
Started on: 9 Aug; 2025
Heat detections: 7,469; in a single hotspot: 190 MW
Danger at start: 31; High · FWI index
Average daily power: 2.5GW; detected power per day, on average

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 9 Aug9 Sept

Play back 10 Sept 2025

How it evolved, day by day

9 Aug 14 Aug 19 Aug 24 Aug 26 Aug 29 Aug 3 Sept 8 Sept

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

The weather it burned in

32°high

50km/h · peak gust

15%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

98% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 57,155 ha in 2016, 67,004 ha in 2017, 40,552 ha in 2018, 67,174 ha in 2019, 53,539 ha in 2020, 51,750 ha in 2021, 46,346 ha in 2022, 39,860 ha in 2023, 56,594 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 108,509 ha that had burned before.

How big is it?

It burned the equivalent of 70% of the area of London (1,102 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

Chipili where it started

54,519 ha reached on 7 Aug

13 %
Kawambwa

51,775 ha reached on 7 Aug

6.4 %
Lupososhi

4,605 ha reached on 17 Aug

1.1 %

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 2025

Built-up area60 ha

Residents≈ 5,700

Inside the perimeter there were about 60 hectares of built-up land and about 5,700 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)
7 Aug	26.6 °C	30 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	High 31
8 Aug	26.7 °C	28 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	High 32
9 Aug	27.1 °C	27 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
10 Aug	26.7 °C	27 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	High 33
11 Aug	26.1 °C	24 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
12 Aug	25.2 °C	27 %	44 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38
13 Aug	25.2 °C	30 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
14 Aug	26.4 °C	29 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
15 Aug	27.7 °C	29 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
16 Aug	27.2 °C	28 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
17 Aug	27.5 °C	23 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
18 Aug	25.9 °C	21 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
19 Aug	25.7 °C	23 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	High 38
20 Aug	26.2 °C	24 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
21 Aug	26.8 °C	22 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38
22 Aug	27.6 °C	24 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
23 Aug	27.5 °C	21 %	47 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
24 Aug	28.2 °C	20 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
25 Aug	30.9 °C	25 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
26 Aug	30.8 °C	24 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
27 Aug	28.9 °C	18 %	46 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 45
28 Aug	29.7 °C	20 %	42 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
29 Aug	29.8 °C	18 %	47 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 47
30 Aug	28.8 °C	19 %	47 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 47
31 Aug	28.2 °C	21 %	48 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 47
1 Sept	28.5 °C	19 %	46 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 47
2 Sept	28.0 °C	21 %	47 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 47
3 Sept	27.9 °C	25 %	50 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 48
4 Sept	28.3 °C	19 %	48 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 47
5 Sept	29.3 °C	17 %	50 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 49
6 Sept	29.7 °C	18 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
7 Sept	30.4 °C	19 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
8 Sept	30.1 °C	19 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
9 Sept	30.0 °C	22 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
10 Sept after	29.9 °C	28 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
11 Sept after	28.8 °C	29 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 41
12 Sept after	30.1 °C	24 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38
13 Sept after	31.0 °C	21 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
14 Sept after	31.1 °C	22 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
15 Sept after	31.1 °C	20 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
16 Sept after	32.0 °C	15 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
17 Sept after	32.8 °C	16 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
18 Sept after	31.9 °C	14 %	42 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 49
19 Sept after	31.2 °C	28 %	40 km/h	0.1 mm	Very high 43
20 Sept after	31.5 °C	24 %	56 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 52
21 Sept after	29.8 °C	26 %	49 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 48
22 Sept after	31.2 °C	26 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
23 Sept after	32.3 °C	23 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
24 Sept after	32.4 °C	19 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 45
25 Sept after	32.1 °C	22 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
26 Sept after	31.6 °C	21 %	47 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 48

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 2 Aug 2025

After · 16 Sept 2025

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 24 August 2025 the air beside the fire reached 95 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 54: 3.6 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak95 µg/m³

Days over the guideline37 days

PM1098 µg/m³

Optical depth0.99

WHO 15

78910111213141516171819202122232425262728293031123456789101112

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 · 7,469Every 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 Zambia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Chipili fire last?: GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 9 August 2025 and 9 September 2025: 32 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 110,204 hectares (1,102.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 3 municipalities: Chipili (54,519 ha, 13 %); Kawambwa (51,775 ha, 6.4 %); Lupososhi (4,605 ha, 1.1 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 32.0 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 50 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

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · Copernicus ↗

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.

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.

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How we know this

Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery; 8 polygons grouped in this page.
Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 7,469 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.

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 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.

Where it burned