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Chobe fire, 12 September 2026 Chobe

Out · last detection 17 Sept 2026, 23:56 UTC

The fire started on 12 September 2026 in Chobe, Botswana, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,349 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 53th largest in Chobe since 2016 (of 129 with a page). Number 65 in Botswana in 2026, of 166.

Burnt area
4,349ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
5days
12 Sept 2026 – 16 Sept 2026
Municipalities hit
1
subdistricts
Started on
12 Sept
2026
Heat detections
82
in a single hotspot: 66 MW
Danger at start
46
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
1.1GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

17 Sept 2026
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 12 Sept16 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

1213141617

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

The weather it burned in

35°high
44km/h · peak gust
17%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.8 mm on 21 Sept.

This area had burned before

91% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 3,575 ha in 2018, 1,273 ha in 2020, 1,434 ha in 2022. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,970 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Chobe where it started
    4,374 ha reached on 12 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)
12 Sept 31.6 °C 20 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
13 Sept 33.2 °C 20 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
14 Sept 34.7 °C 21 % 44 km/h 0.4 mm Very high 48
15 Sept 34.0 °C 21 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
16 Sept 34.4 °C 17 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
17 Sept after 34.5 °C 12 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
18 Sept after 34.0 °C 15 % 56 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 66
19 Sept after 32.3 °C 24 % 67 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 70
20 Sept after 28.7 °C 31 % 56 km/h 0.8 mm Very high 40
21 Sept after 25.9 °C 45 % 45 km/h 1.8 mm Moderate 16

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 5 Sept 2026
After · 23 Sept 2026

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

The smoke

CAMS · Copernicus

On 18 September 2026 the air beside the fire reached 43 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 33: 2.2 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak43 µg/m³
Days over the guideline6 days
PM1045 µg/m³
Optical depth0.59
10111213141516171819
Good Fair Moderate Poor Very poor Extremely poor

Particles from the Copernicus CAMS model at the centre of the perimeter; these are not measurements in each town. The pale bar is the worst hour, the solid one the daily average.

Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS)

Detections table · 82Every 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 12 September 2026 and 16 September 2026: 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 4,349 hectares (43.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Chobe (4,374 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 34.7 °C, humidity dropped to 17 % and gusts hit 44 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 52, 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.