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Funhalouro fire, September 2018 Funhalouro

Out · last detection 24 Sept 2018, 11:48 UTC

The fire started on 16 September 2018 in Funhalouro, Mozambique, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,500 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 14th largest in Inhambane since 2016 (of 26 with a page). Number 150 in Mozambique in 2018, of 220.

Burnt area
3,500ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
8days
16 Sept 2018 – 23 Sept 2018
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
16 Sept
2018
Heat detections
109
in a single hotspot: 45 MW
Danger at start
34
High · FWI index
Energy released
1.1GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

24 Sept 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 16 Sept23 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

1617181920212324

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

The weather it burned in

37°high
55km/h · peak gust
23%lowest humidity

It had gone 6 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.2 mm on 29 Sept.

This area had burned before

5% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 163 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Funhalouro where it started
    3,521 ha reached on 14 Sept
    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)
16 Sept 32.1 °C 31 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
17 Sept 34.7 °C 29 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
18 Sept 37.2 °C 23 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
19 Sept 36.8 °C 24 % 55 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
20 Sept 31.0 °C 46 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
21 Sept 30.7 °C 45 % 30 km/h 0.1 mm High 28
22 Sept 32.4 °C 40 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
23 Sept 32.1 °C 37 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
24 Sept after 33.7 °C 30 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
25 Sept after 33.9 °C 23 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
26 Sept after 36.0 °C 29 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
27 Sept after 34.6 °C 32 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
28 Sept after 35.7 °C 27 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
29 Sept after 31.5 °C 46 % 66 km/h 1.2 mm High 34

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 9 Sept 2018
After · 30 Sept 2018

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 · 109Every 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 Mozambique ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Funhalouro fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 16 September 2018 and 23 September 2018: 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 3,500 hectares (35.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Funhalouro (3,521 ha, 0.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 37.2 °C, humidity dropped to 23 % and gusts hit 55 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 Mozambique (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 (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.