Dirico fire, 19 August 2024 Dirico
The fire started on 19 August 2024 in Dirico, Angola, and satellites saw it burning for 14 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 12,712 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 117th largest in Cuando Cubango since 2016 (of 658 with a page). Number 18 in Angola in 2024, of 135.
- Burnt area
- 12,712ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 14days
- 19 Aug 2024 – 1 Sept 2024
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- municipalities
- Started on
- 19 Aug
- 2024
- Heat detections
- 448
- in a single hotspot: 64 MW
- Danger at start
- 55
- Extreme · FWI index
- Energy released
- 4.1GW
- sum of detected power
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
86% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 974 ha in 2016, 3,616 ha in 2017, 2,974 ha in 2018, 1,714 ha in 2019, 5,217 ha in 2020, 343 ha in 2021, 3,441 ha in 2022, 3,113 ha in 2023. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 10,908 ha that had burned before.
- 2,974 ha Dirico fire, September 2018 15,259 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,761 ha Dirico fire, August 2023 32,075 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 27 ha Dirico fire, August 2017 5,813 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 7 ha Dirico fire, August 2020 8,820 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Dirico where it started12,782 ha reached on 17 Aug0.7 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 17 Aug | 31.8 °C | 12 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 55 |
| 18 Aug | 31.3 °C | 13 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 53 |
| 19 Aug | 31.9 °C | 9 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 58 |
| 20 Aug | 31.5 °C | 9 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 58 |
| 21 Aug | 31.0 °C | 8 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 55 |
| 22 Aug | 31.0 °C | 9 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 23 Aug | 30.9 °C | 10 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 63 |
| 24 Aug | 30.3 °C | 10 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 62 |
| 25 Aug | 30.4 °C | 11 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 26 Aug | 31.7 °C | 11 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 55 |
| 27 Aug | 32.8 °C | 10 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 53 |
| 28 Aug | 33.7 °C | 9 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 50 |
| 29 Aug | 33.6 °C | 8 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 55 |
| 30 Aug | 33.9 °C | 7 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 62 |
| 31 Aug | 31.5 °C | 20 % | 52 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 60 |
| 1 Sept | 29.8 °C | 14 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 57 |
| 2 Sept after | 29.3 °C | 14 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 3 Sept after | 30.0 °C | 10 % | 43 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 54 |
| 4 Sept after | 30.2 °C | 11 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 56 |
| 5 Sept after | 30.9 °C | 10 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 6 Sept after | 32.1 °C | 8 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 7 Sept after | 33.4 °C | 9 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 54 |
| 8 Sept after | 34.7 °C | 8 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 57 |
| 9 Sept after | 35.7 °C | 9 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 58 |
| 10 Sept after | 36.0 °C | 10 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 61 |
| 11 Sept after | 35.5 °C | 13 % | 48 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 65 |
| 12 Sept after | 35.9 °C | 12 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 64 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
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 · CopernicusOn 18 August 2024 the air beside the fire reached 33 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 23: 1.5 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
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 · 448Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Dirico fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 19 August 2024 and 1 September 2024: 14 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 12,712 hectares (127.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Dirico (12,782 ha, 0.7 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 33.9 °C, humidity dropped to 7 % and gusts hit 52 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 63, class Extreme.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Angola (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.
Report an error
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.