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Chitambo fire, 1 September 2025 Chitambo, Lavushimanda

Out · last detection 21 Sept 2025, 23:14 UTC

The fire started on 1 September 2025 in Chitambo, Zambia, and satellites saw it burning for 20 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 65,144 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the largest fire in Central since 2016 (of 400 with a page). Number 11 in Zambia in 2025, of 271.

Burnt area
65,144ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
20days
1 Sept 2025 – 20 Sept 2025
Municipalities hit
2
districts
Started on
1 Sept
2025
Heat detections
1,949
in a single hotspot: 120 MW
Danger at start
37
High · FWI index
Energy released
14.4GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

21 Sept 2025
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 1 Sept20 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

123456789101112131415161718192021

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

The weather it burned in

30°high
55km/h · peak gust
15%lowest humidity

It had gone 33 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

94% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 26,882 ha in 2016, 24,780 ha in 2017, 27,323 ha in 2018, 20,872 ha in 2019, 36,792 ha in 2020, 33,971 ha in 2021, 19,579 ha in 2022, 29,240 ha in 2023, 22,492 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 61,240 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Chitambo where it started
    62,957 ha reached on 25 Aug
    5.2 %
  2. Lavushimanda
    2,645 ha reached on 27 Aug
    0.2 %

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)
1 Sept 25.7 °C 24 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
2 Sept 23.5 °C 35 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
3 Sept 23.6 °C 33 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
4 Sept 25.4 °C 24 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
5 Sept 26.1 °C 24 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
6 Sept 26.7 °C 21 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
7 Sept 26.6 °C 25 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
8 Sept 26.4 °C 23 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
9 Sept 26.7 °C 27 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
10 Sept 26.0 °C 35 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
11 Sept 26.8 °C 32 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
12 Sept 26.5 °C 30 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
13 Sept 26.4 °C 30 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
14 Sept 26.6 °C 31 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
15 Sept 28.1 °C 22 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
16 Sept 29.6 °C 15 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
17 Sept 30.1 °C 15 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
18 Sept 28.1 °C 25 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
19 Sept 28.3 °C 33 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
20 Sept 25.2 °C 42 % 55 km/h 0.2 mm Very high 39
21 Sept after 25.7 °C 36 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
22 Sept after 27.7 °C 30 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
23 Sept after 28.3 °C 24 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
24 Sept after 28.5 °C 25 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
25 Sept after 28.1 °C 26 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
26 Sept after 27.3 °C 30 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
27 Sept after 27.7 °C 29 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
28 Sept after 31.9 °C 19 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
29 Sept after 32.7 °C 18 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
30 Sept after 28.5 °C 35 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 25 Aug 2025
After · 27 Sept 2025

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 13 September 2025 the air beside the fire reached 56 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 42: 2.8 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak56 µg/m³
Days over the guideline23 days
PM1058 µg/m³
Optical depth1.00
30311234567891011121314151617181920212223
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 · 1,949Every 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 Chitambo fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 1 September 2025 and 20 September 2025: 20 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 65,144 hectares (651.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Chitambo (62,957 ha, 5.2 %); Lavushimanda (2,645 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 30.1 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 55 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.