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AO · Angola · →

Chitato fire, June 2020 Chitato

Out · last detection 27 Jun 2020, 12:55 UTC

The fire started on 23 June 2020 in Chitato, Angola, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 6,601 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 208th largest in Lunda Norte since 2016 (of 411 with a page). Number 62 in Angola in 2020, of 123.

Burnt area
6,601ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
5days
23 Jun 2020 – 27 Jun 2020
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
23 Jun
2020
Heat detections
180
in a single hotspot: 69 MW
Danger at start
41
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
1.7GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

27 Jun 2020
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 23 Jun27 Jun

How it evolved, day by day

2324252627

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

The weather it burned in

33°high
37km/h · peak gust
18%lowest humidity

It had gone 47 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

70% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,841 ha in 2016, 946 ha in 2017, 2,482 ha in 2018, 2,393 ha in 2019. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 4,609 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Chitato where it started
    6,640 ha reached on 23 Jun
    0.6 %

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)
23 Jun 31.6 °C 20 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
24 Jun 32.9 °C 22 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
25 Jun 33.0 °C 18 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
26 Jun 31.6 °C 20 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
27 Jun 31.1 °C 29 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
28 Jun after 32.8 °C 23 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
29 Jun after 33.4 °C 22 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
30 Jun after 33.7 °C 16 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
1 Jul after 31.8 °C 29 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
2 Jul after 31.5 °C 32 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
3 Jul after 32.2 °C 22 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
4 Jul after 33.1 °C 14 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
5 Jul after 32.5 °C 18 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
6 Jul after 32.0 °C 19 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
7 Jul after 32.0 °C 19 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 16 Jun 2020
After · 4 Jul 2020

If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.

Detections table · 180Every 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 Angola ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Chitato fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 23 June 2020 and 27 June 2020: 5 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 6,601 hectares (66.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Chitato (6,640 ha, 0.6 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 33.0 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 37 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 43, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Angola (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 (Public Domain). 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.