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Hwange fire, 9 October 2021 Hwange

Out · last detection 13 Oct 2021, 22:54 UTC

The fire started on 9 October 2021 in Hwange, Zimbabwe, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,626 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 125th largest in Matabeleland North since 2016 (of 484 with a page). Number 20 in Zimbabwe in 2021, of 176.

Burnt area
3,626ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
5days
9 Oct 2021 – 13 Oct 2021
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
9 Oct
2021
Heat detections
104
in a single hotspot: 86 MW
Danger at start
41
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
1.4GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

13 Oct 2021
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 9 Oct13 Oct

How it evolved, day by day

910111213

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

The weather it burned in

38°high
58km/h · peak gust
13%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

1% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 19 ha in 2019.

What happened to each town

  1. Hwange where it started
    3,638 ha reached on 9 Oct
    0.1 %

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.

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)
9 Oct 35.9 °C 19 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
10 Oct 38.0 °C 13 % 58 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 71
11 Oct 30.7 °C 28 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
12 Oct 31.1 °C 23 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
13 Oct 33.7 °C 15 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
14 Oct after 35.3 °C 10 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
15 Oct after 36.7 °C 11 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
16 Oct after 38.1 °C 10 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
17 Oct after 38.2 °C 10 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
18 Oct after 34.7 °C 15 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 68
19 Oct after 27.2 °C 46 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
20 Oct after 29.4 °C 37 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
21 Oct after 31.2 °C 32 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
22 Oct after 34.4 °C 27 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
23 Oct after 36.7 °C 23 % 27 km/h 0.2 mm Very high 39

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 2 Oct 2021
After · 20 Oct 2021

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 · 104Every 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 Zimbabwe ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Hwange fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 9 October 2021 and 13 October 2021: 5 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 3,626 hectares (36.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Hwange (3,638 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 38.0 °C, humidity dropped to 13 % and gusts hit 58 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 71, class Very extreme.
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.

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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.