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Chitambo fire, 29 July 2026 Chitambo

Out · last detection 4 Sept 2026, 11:49 UTC

The fire started on 29 July 2026 in Chitambo, Zambia, and satellites saw it burning for 37 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 19,155 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 20th largest in Central since 2016 (of 400 with a page). Number 38 in Zambia in 2026, of 604.

Burnt area
19,155ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
37days
29 Jul 2026 – 3 Sept 2026
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
29 Jul
2026
Heat detections
574
in a single hotspot: 66 MW
Danger at start
35
High · FWI index
Energy released
5.0GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

4 Sept 2026
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 29 Jul3 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

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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
48km/h · peak gust
24%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

85% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,918 ha in 2016, 5,067 ha in 2017, 5,043 ha in 2018, 5,373 ha in 2019, 2,811 ha in 2020, 6,348 ha in 2021, 6,323 ha in 2022, 4,412 ha in 2023, 5,528 ha in 2024, 5,774 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 16,296 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Chitambo where it started
    19,230 ha reached on 29 Jul
    1.6 %

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)
29 Jul 27.2 °C 26 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
30 Jul 27.2 °C 28 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
31 Jul 26.1 °C 25 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
1 Aug 24.4 °C 31 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
2 Aug 24.2 °C 32 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
3 Aug 24.8 °C 33 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
4 Aug 25.5 °C 32 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
5 Aug 26.1 °C 31 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
6 Aug 27.1 °C 33 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
7 Aug 27.5 °C 36 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
8 Aug 26.8 °C 37 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
9 Aug 27.7 °C 33 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
10 Aug 29.5 °C 29 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
11 Aug 29.7 °C 28 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
12 Aug 28.0 °C 31 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
13 Aug 24.2 °C 45 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
14 Aug 22.8 °C 46 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
15 Aug 24.3 °C 35 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
16 Aug 24.9 °C 30 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
17 Aug 26.1 °C 26 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
18 Aug 27.1 °C 24 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
19 Aug 26.4 °C 27 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
20 Aug 26.3 °C 32 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
21 Aug 27.0 °C 30 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
22 Aug 27.6 °C 32 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
23 Aug 27.8 °C 34 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
24 Aug 28.1 °C 34 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
25 Aug 29.1 °C 34 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
26 Aug 29.3 °C 37 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
27 Aug 27.4 °C 40 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
28 Aug 26.3 °C 37 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
29 Aug 28.2 °C 32 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
30 Aug 29.6 °C 26 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
31 Aug 29.8 °C 25 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
1 Sept 29.8 °C 28 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
2 Sept 29.3 °C 31 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
3 Sept 29.9 °C 31 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
4 Sept after 30.5 °C 30 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
5 Sept after 29.1 °C 36 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
6 Sept after 29.7 °C 36 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
7 Sept after 29.2 °C 36 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
8 Sept after 27.0 °C 36 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
9 Sept after 25.3 °C 41 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
10 Sept after 28.1 °C 34 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
11 Sept after 29.4 °C 30 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
12 Sept after 30.8 °C 26 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
13 Sept after 30.1 °C 29 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 37

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 22 Jul 2026
After · 10 Sept 2026

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 5 September 2026 the air beside the fire reached 71 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 42: 2.8 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak71 µg/m³
Days over the guideline28 days
PM1076 µg/m³
Optical depth1.38
272829303112345678910111213141516171819202122232425262728293031123456
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 · 574Every 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?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 29 July 2026 to 3 September 2026 (37 days). The perimeter dates it from 31 July 2026 to 31 August 2026.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 19,155 hectares (191.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Chitambo (19,230 ha, 1.6 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 29.9 °C, humidity dropped to 24 % and gusts hit 48 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 41, 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.