Hwange fire, 12 October 2018 Hwange
The fire started on 12 October 2018 in Hwange, Zimbabwe, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 1,538 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 280th largest in Matabeleland North since 2016 (of 484 with a page). Number 105 in Zimbabwe in 2018, of 265.
- Burnt area
- 1,538ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 2days
- 12 Oct 2018 – 13 Oct 2018
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- districts
- Started on
- 12 Oct
- 2018
- Heat detections
- 35
- in a single hotspot: 158 MW
- Energy released
- 1.0GW
- 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.
This area had burned before
70% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 575 ha in 2016, 947 ha in 2017. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 1,072 ha that had burned before.
- 947 ha Hwange fire, September 2017 5,379 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 373 ha Hwange fire, June 2016 1,245 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 202 ha Hwange fire, June 2016 1,278 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Hwange where it started1,540 ha reached on 12 Oct0.1 %
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.
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.
Detections table · 35Every 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 Hwange fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 12 October 2018 and 13 October 2018: 2 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 1,538 hectares (15.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Hwange (1,540 ha, 0.1 %).
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Zimbabwe (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 (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.