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Chobe fire, 18 August 2019 Chobe

Out · last detection 24 Aug 2019, 12:27 UTC

The fire started on 18 August 2019 in Chobe, Botswana, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,548 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 49th largest in Chobe since 2016 (of 129 with a page). Number 31 in Botswana in 2019, of 73.

Burnt area
4,548ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
7days
18 Aug 2019 – 24 Aug 2019
Municipalities hit
1
subdistricts
Started on
18 Aug
2019
Heat detections
150
in a single hotspot: 473 MW
Danger at start
47
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
4.2GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

24 Aug 2019
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 18 Aug24 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

18192021222324

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

The weather it burned in

27°high
52km/h · peak gust
15%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

82% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,508 ha in 2016, 2,780 ha in 2017, 804 ha in 2018. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,746 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Chobe where it started
    4,573 ha reached on 18 Aug
    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)
18 Aug 26.8 °C 18 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
19 Aug 26.1 °C 18 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
20 Aug 26.9 °C 17 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
21 Aug 24.4 °C 31 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
22 Aug 24.2 °C 22 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
23 Aug 25.5 °C 15 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
24 Aug 25.7 °C 17 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
25 Aug after 26.5 °C 16 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
26 Aug after 29.3 °C 20 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
27 Aug after 32.0 °C 18 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
28 Aug after 33.0 °C 19 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
29 Aug after 32.7 °C 19 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
30 Aug after 32.7 °C 21 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
31 Aug after 32.5 °C 12 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
1 Sept after 30.3 °C 5 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
2 Sept after 30.1 °C 16 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
3 Sept after 30.8 °C 24 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 11 Aug 2019
After · 31 Aug 2019

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 · 150Every 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 18 August 2019 and 24 August 2019: 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 4,548 hectares (45.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Chobe (4,573 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 26.9 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 52 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 49, class Very high.
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.