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Chobe fire, 10 October 2016 Chobe

Out · last detection 17 Oct 2016, 12:46 UTC

The fire started on 10 October 2016 in Chobe, Botswana, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,884 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 43th largest in Chobe since 2016 (of 130 with a page). Number 23 in Botswana in 2016, of 76.

Burnt area
4,884ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
7days
10 Oct 2016 – 16 Oct 2016
Municipalities hit
1
subdistricts
Started on
10 Oct
2016
Heat detections
249
in a single hotspot: 119 MW
Danger at start
46
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
4.9GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

17 Oct 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 10 Oct16 Oct

How it evolved, day by day

1011121314151617

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

The weather it burned in

38°high
49km/h · peak gust
11%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

  1. Chobe where it started
    4,911 ha reached on 10 Oct
    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)
10 Oct 36.9 °C 16 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
11 Oct 37.5 °C 15 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
12 Oct 37.6 °C 14 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 59
13 Oct 37.9 °C 14 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
14 Oct 37.4 °C 13 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
15 Oct 36.8 °C 11 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
16 Oct 37.9 °C 11 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
17 Oct after 39.4 °C 10 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
18 Oct after 37.8 °C 12 % 56 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 72
19 Oct after 35.4 °C 17 % 58 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 70
20 Oct after 36.2 °C 16 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 65
21 Oct after 36.9 °C 13 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
22 Oct after 37.4 °C 14 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
23 Oct after 35.0 °C 20 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
24 Oct after 35.5 °C 19 % 42 km/h 0.4 mm Extreme 53
25 Oct after 37.9 °C 17 % 28 km/h 0.3 mm Extreme 51
26 Oct after 37.5 °C 17 % 42 km/h 0.2 mm Extreme 55

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 3 Oct 2016
After · 23 Oct 2016

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 · 249Every 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 Botswana ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Chobe fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 10 October 2016 and 16 October 2016: 7 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 4,884 hectares (48.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Chobe (4,911 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 37.9 °C, humidity dropped to 11 % and gusts hit 49 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 60, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Botswana (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.