How long did the Gilé fire last?

GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 7 September 2017 and 18 September 2017: 12 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 14,416 hectares (144.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 2 municipalities: Gilé (14,391 ha, 1.6 %); Alto Molocue (81 ha, 0.0 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 33.6 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 37 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 40, class Very high.

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.

MZ · Mozambique · 2017-09-07 → 2017-09-18

Gilé fire, 7 September 2017 Gilé, Alto Molocue

Out · last detection 19 Sept 2017, 10:47 UTC

The fire started on 7 September 2017 in Gilé, Mozambique, and satellites saw it burning for 12 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 14,416 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 107th largest in Zambézia since 2016 (of 842 with a page). Number 11 in Mozambique in 2017, of 196.

Burnt area: 14,416ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 12days; 7 Sept 2017 – 18 Sept 2017
Municipalities hit: 2; districts
Started on: 7 Sept; 2017
Heat detections: 640; in a single hotspot: 171 MW
Danger at start: 21; Moderate · FWI index
Average daily power: 590MW; detected power per day, on average

Play back 19 Sept 2017

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 7 Sept18 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

7 Sept 9 Sept 11 Sept 13 Sept 15 Sept 17 Sept 19 Sept

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

The weather it burned in

34°high

37km/h · peak gust

18%lowest humidity

It had gone 16 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 3.0 mm on 28 Sept.

This area had burned before

70% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 10,444 ha in 2016.

9,760 ha Ribaué fire, September 2016 63,932 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire

What happened to each town

Gilé where it started

14,391 ha reached on 5 Sept

1.6 %
Alto Molocue

81 ha reached on 15 Sept

0.0 %

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)
5 Sept	26.6 °C	42 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 21
6 Sept	28.3 °C	43 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	High 22
7 Sept	30.1 °C	32 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	High 28
8 Sept	31.4 °C	25 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	High 32
9 Sept	31.2 °C	25 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
10 Sept	30.2 °C	29 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
11 Sept	30.7 °C	31 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
12 Sept	30.4 °C	34 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	High 33
13 Sept	31.7 °C	27 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	High 33
14 Sept	32.6 °C	22 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
15 Sept	31.6 °C	18 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
16 Sept	31.3 °C	26 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
17 Sept	33.6 °C	21 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
18 Sept	32.1 °C	33 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
19 Sept after	32.5 °C	32 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
20 Sept after	32.6 °C	31 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	High 38
21 Sept after	29.5 °C	42 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	High 31
22 Sept after	30.8 °C	35 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	High 31
23 Sept after	32.8 °C	24 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
24 Sept after	28.4 °C	39 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	High 31
25 Sept after	30.7 °C	35 %	25 km/h	0.0 mm	High 30
26 Sept after	33.7 °C	27 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
27 Sept after	33.9 °C	29 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	High 38
28 Sept after	31.3 °C	33 %	41 km/h	3.0 mm	Moderate 15

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 31 Aug 2017

After · 25 Sept 2017

Before After

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 · 640Every 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 time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Mozambique ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Gilé fire last?: GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 7 September 2017 and 18 September 2017: 12 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 14,416 hectares (144.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 2 municipalities: Gilé (14,391 ha, 1.6 %); Alto Molocue (81 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 33.6 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 37 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 40, class Very high.
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

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · Copernicus ↗

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?

Dates or duration Place or towns Burned area Name It was not a wildfire Same fire as another page Something else

What really happened?

Your connection to the fire (optional) Email (optional)

We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy.

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.

Where it burned