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Chunya fire, August 2019 Chunya

Out · last detection 23 Aug 2019, 11:08 UTC

The fire started on 15 August 2019 in Chunya, Tanzania, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,591 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 60th largest in Mbeya since 2016 (of 147 with a page). Number 54 in Tanzania in 2019, of 123.

Burnt area
4,591ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
8days
15 Aug 2019 – 22 Aug 2019
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
15 Aug
2019
Heat detections
159
in a single hotspot: 36 MW
Danger at start
52
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
1.1GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

23 Aug 2019
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 15 Aug22 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

151617181920212223

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

The weather it burned in

29°high
51km/h · peak gust
20%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

7% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 327 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Chunya where it started
    4,616 ha reached on 14 Aug
    0.3 %

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)
15 Aug 28.1 °C 20 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
16 Aug 27.3 °C 24 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
17 Aug 27.6 °C 24 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
18 Aug 28.6 °C 21 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
19 Aug 28.0 °C 20 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
20 Aug 28.3 °C 21 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
21 Aug 28.0 °C 25 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
22 Aug 28.4 °C 27 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
23 Aug after 28.4 °C 27 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
24 Aug after 29.5 °C 27 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
25 Aug after 29.9 °C 25 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
26 Aug after 30.1 °C 23 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
27 Aug after 31.1 °C 23 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
28 Aug after 30.0 °C 24 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
29 Aug after 29.9 °C 25 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
30 Aug after 30.2 °C 23 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
31 Aug after 30.9 °C 22 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
1 Sept after 30.5 °C 30 % 34 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 · 8 Aug 2019
After · 29 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 · 159Every 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 Tanzania ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Chunya fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 15 August 2019 and 22 August 2019: 8 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 4,591 hectares (45.9 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Chunya (4,616 ha, 0.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 28.6 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 51 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 Tanzania (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.

Emergency number: 112

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.

Report an error
What do you think is wrong?

We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy. This is not an emergency service: if there is a fire now, call 112.

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.