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Chobe fire, 19 September 2018 Chobe

Out · last detection 22 Sept 2018, 23:37 UTC

The fire started on 19 September 2018 in Chobe, Botswana, and satellites saw it burning for 3 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,835 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 65th largest in Chobe since 2016 (of 129 with a page). Number 46 in Botswana in 2018, of 93.

Burnt area
3,835ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
3days
19 Sept 2018 – 21 Sept 2018
Municipalities hit
1
subdistricts
Started on
19 Sept
2018
Heat detections
198
in a single hotspot: 174 MW
Danger at start
61
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
1.8GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

22 Sept 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 19 Sept21 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

19202122

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

The weather it burned in

36°high
52km/h · peak gust
9%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

37% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,307 ha in 2016, 130 ha in 2017.

What happened to each town

  1. Chobe where it started
    3,849 ha reached on 17 Sept
    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)
19 Sept 36.0 °C 9 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
20 Sept 36.2 °C 11 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 65
21 Sept 35.1 °C 12 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 71
22 Sept after 33.0 °C 21 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
23 Sept after 34.2 °C 10 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
24 Sept after 34.1 °C 12 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
25 Sept after 35.2 °C 16 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 62
26 Sept after 36.7 °C 14 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
27 Sept after 36.5 °C 13 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
28 Sept after 36.7 °C 14 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 62
29 Sept after 35.1 °C 16 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
30 Sept after 31.6 °C 22 % 63 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 70
1 Oct after 29.5 °C 25 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 12 Sept 2018
After · 28 Sept 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 · 198Every 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 19 September 2018 and 21 September 2018: 3 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 3,835 hectares (38.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Chobe (3,849 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 36.2 °C, humidity dropped to 9 % and gusts hit 52 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 71, class Very 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.