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Gorongosa fire, 8 September 2016 Gorongosa

Out · last detection 25 Sept 2016, 11:18 UTC

The fire started on 8 September 2016 in Gorongosa, Mozambique, and satellites saw it burning for 17 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 11,928 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 23th largest in Sofala since 2016 (of 214 with a page). Number 18 in Mozambique in 2016, of 194.

Burnt area
11,928ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
17days
8 Sept 2016 – 24 Sept 2016
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
8 Sept
2016
Heat detections
650
in a single hotspot: 87 MW
Danger at start
22
High · FWI index
Energy released
4.8GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

25 Sept 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 8 Sept24 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

891011121315161718192122232425

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
45km/h · peak gust
23%lowest humidity

It had gone 9 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 7.9 mm on 2 Oct.

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

  1. Gorongosa where it started
    11,999 ha reached on 2 Sept
    1.8 %

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)
2 Sept 26.0 °C 42 % 31 km/h 0.1 mm High 22
3 Sept 27.0 °C 41 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
4 Sept 27.8 °C 47 % 24 km/h 0.1 mm Moderate 21
5 Sept 29.7 °C 37 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
6 Sept 32.1 °C 34 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
7 Sept 31.8 °C 31 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
8 Sept 33.1 °C 33 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
9 Sept 34.3 °C 24 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
10 Sept 32.8 °C 23 % 40 km/h 0.1 mm Very high 40
11 Sept 27.0 °C 50 % 32 km/h 3.2 mm Low 6
12 Sept 28.1 °C 42 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 14
13 Sept 29.7 °C 38 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
14 Sept 27.2 °C 48 % 30 km/h 1.4 mm Moderate 12
15 Sept 31.2 °C 35 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
16 Sept 33.8 °C 23 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
17 Sept 36.0 °C 26 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
18 Sept 31.2 °C 40 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
19 Sept 25.1 °C 65 % 42 km/h 2.7 mm Low 6
20 Sept 25.1 °C 63 % 30 km/h 0.8 mm Low 8
21 Sept 29.6 °C 42 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
22 Sept 32.8 °C 27 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
23 Sept 35.4 °C 24 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
24 Sept 33.6 °C 25 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
25 Sept after 33.6 °C 27 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
26 Sept after 30.0 °C 37 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
27 Sept after 32.4 °C 32 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
28 Sept after 36.9 °C 23 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
29 Sept after 32.4 °C 33 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
30 Sept after 32.6 °C 30 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
1 Oct after 33.5 °C 27 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
2 Oct after 34.6 °C 30 % 47 km/h 7.9 mm Moderate 12

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 1 Sept 2016
After · 1 Oct 2016

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 · 650Every 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 Gorongosa fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 8 September 2016 and 24 September 2016: 17 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 11,928 hectares (119.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Gorongosa (11,999 ha, 1.8 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 36.9 °C, humidity dropped to 23 % and gusts hit 45 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

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.