Dirico fire, 7 September 2025 Dirico
The fire started on 7 September 2025 in Dirico, Angola, and satellites saw it burning for 6 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 5,541 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 550th largest in Cuando Cubango since 2016 (of 659 with a page). Number 145 in Angola in 2025, of 191.
- Burnt area
- 5,541ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 6days
- 7 Sept 2025 – 12 Sept 2025
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- municipalities
- Started on
- 7 Sept
- 2025
- Heat detections
- 114
- in a single hotspot: 133 MW
- Danger at start
- 54
- Extreme · FWI index
- Energy released
- 2.0GW
- 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
60% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 240 ha in 2016, 411 ha in 2018, 1,144 ha in 2019, 1,373 ha in 2020, 61 ha in 2021, 1,395 ha in 2022, 963 ha in 2023, 1,068 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,306 ha that had burned before.
What happened to each town
-
Dirico where it started5,581 ha reached on 7 Sept0.3 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 7 Sept | 35.1 °C | 8 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 54 |
| 8 Sept | 35.2 °C | 7 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 61 |
| 9 Sept | 35.5 °C | 9 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 59 |
| 10 Sept | 36.0 °C | 8 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 59 |
| 11 Sept | 35.0 °C | 11 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 64 |
| 12 Sept | 34.8 °C | 10 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 61 |
| 13 Sept after | 35.8 °C | 9 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 68 |
| 14 Sept after | 36.3 °C | 8 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 54 |
| 15 Sept after | 36.1 °C | 8 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 58 |
| 16 Sept after | 36.9 °C | 9 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 55 |
| 17 Sept after | 36.6 °C | 7 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 60 |
| 18 Sept after | 37.5 °C | 9 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 65 |
| 19 Sept after | 36.5 °C | 11 % | 51 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 72 |
| 20 Sept after | 35.7 °C | 10 % | 49 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 72 |
| 21 Sept after | 34.9 °C | 18 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 58 |
| 22 Sept after | 34.3 °C | 15 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 51 |
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 9 September 2025 the air beside the fire reached 37 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 28: 1.8 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 · 114Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 10,673 haDirico20 August 2022 · 20 days · 10 km away
- 15,259 haDirico26 September 2018 · 19 days · 28 km away
- 24,522 haDirico5 August 2022 · 15 days · 34 km away
- 15,913 haDirico26 July 2026 · 35 days · 37 km away
- 13,566 haDirico8 September 2017 · 5 days · 37 km away
- 12,712 haDirico19 August 2024 · 14 days · 37 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Dirico fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 7 September 2025 and 12 September 2025: 6 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 5,541 hectares (55.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Dirico (5,581 ha, 0.3 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 36.0 °C, humidity dropped to 7 % and gusts hit 41 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 64, 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.