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Chiuta fire, August 2018 Chiuta

Out · last detection 18 Aug 2018, 22:52 UTC

The fire started on 6 August 2018 in Chiuta, Mozambique, and satellites saw it burning for 12 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 8,906 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 12th largest in Tete since 2016 (of 114 with a page). Number 34 in Mozambique in 2018, of 220.

Burnt area
8,906ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
12days
6 Aug 2018 – 17 Aug 2018
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
6 Aug
2018
Heat detections
344
in a single hotspot: 75 MW
Danger at start
26
High · FWI index
Energy released
3.2GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

18 Aug 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 6 Aug17 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

6789101112131415161718

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

The weather it burned in

34°high
38km/h · peak gust
23%lowest humidity

It had gone 12 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

48% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,225 ha in 2016, 3,920 ha in 2017. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 4,291 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Chiuta where it started
    8,952 ha reached on 6 Aug
    1.2 %

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)
6 Aug 31.6 °C 23 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
7 Aug 32.4 °C 24 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
8 Aug 33.6 °C 25 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
9 Aug 28.4 °C 40 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
10 Aug 30.9 °C 36 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
11 Aug 31.6 °C 24 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
12 Aug 30.6 °C 29 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
13 Aug 30.3 °C 27 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
14 Aug 30.8 °C 23 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
15 Aug 30.2 °C 27 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
16 Aug 30.5 °C 26 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
17 Aug 30.8 °C 25 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
18 Aug after 31.7 °C 26 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
19 Aug after 28.6 °C 40 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
20 Aug after 29.4 °C 27 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
21 Aug after 30.9 °C 27 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
22 Aug after 31.3 °C 27 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
23 Aug after 32.0 °C 25 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
24 Aug after 31.0 °C 26 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
25 Aug after 29.9 °C 28 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
26 Aug after 31.2 °C 27 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
27 Aug after 32.3 °C 16 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 30 Jul 2018
After · 24 Aug 2018

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 · 344Every 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 Mozambique ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Chiuta fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 6 August 2018 and 17 August 2018: 12 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 8,906 hectares (89.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Chiuta (8,952 ha, 1.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 33.6 °C, humidity dropped to 23 % and gusts hit 38 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 35, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Mozambique (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 3.0 Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY 3.0 IGO)). 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.