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Iringa fire, 28 July 2023 Iringa

Out · last detection 8 Sept 2023, 22:20 UTC

The fire started on 28 July 2023 in Iringa, Tanzania, and satellites saw it burning for 43 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 42,802 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 7th largest in Iringa since 2016 (of 71 with a page). The largest in Tanzania in 2023, of 44.

Burnt area
42,802ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
43days
28 Jul 2023 – 8 Sept 2023
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
28 Jul
2023
Heat detections
2,288
in a single hotspot: 217 MW
Danger at start
31
High · FWI index
Energy released
15.3GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

8 Sept 2023
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 28 Jul8 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

282930311234567891011121314151617181920212223242526272829303112345678

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

The weather it burned in

31°high
44km/h · peak gust
20%lowest humidity

It had gone 51 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

100% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 30,907 ha in 2016, 4,905 ha in 2017, 30,574 ha in 2018, 30,977 ha in 2019, 20,304 ha in 2020, 30,540 ha in 2021. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 42,815 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Iringa where it started
    43,074 ha reached on 27 Jul
    2.3 %

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)
28 Jul 26.9 °C 32 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
29 Jul 27.7 °C 35 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
30 Jul 29.1 °C 32 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
31 Jul 28.8 °C 28 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
1 Aug 28.0 °C 25 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
2 Aug 26.0 °C 34 % 38 km/h 0.1 mm High 37
3 Aug 27.7 °C 31 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
4 Aug 26.3 °C 30 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
5 Aug 27.4 °C 28 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
6 Aug 25.3 °C 40 % 35 km/h 0.1 mm High 32
7 Aug 25.7 °C 37 % 31 km/h 0.3 mm High 31
8 Aug 27.2 °C 28 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
9 Aug 27.7 °C 27 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
10 Aug 26.0 °C 33 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
11 Aug 27.4 °C 32 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
12 Aug 26.8 °C 35 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
13 Aug 27.0 °C 36 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
14 Aug 28.5 °C 34 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
15 Aug 29.3 °C 33 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
16 Aug 28.9 °C 31 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
17 Aug 28.5 °C 28 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
18 Aug 28.4 °C 27 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
19 Aug 28.7 °C 29 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
20 Aug 30.2 °C 20 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
21 Aug 29.8 °C 27 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
22 Aug 30.8 °C 30 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
23 Aug 29.6 °C 30 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
24 Aug 29.4 °C 25 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
25 Aug 28.9 °C 29 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
26 Aug 29.8 °C 33 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
27 Aug 30.2 °C 26 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
28 Aug 27.7 °C 30 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
29 Aug 28.1 °C 27 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
30 Aug 29.2 °C 27 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
31 Aug 29.1 °C 29 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
1 Sept 29.3 °C 30 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
2 Sept 28.4 °C 32 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
3 Sept 28.7 °C 32 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
4 Sept 29.1 °C 31 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
5 Sept 29.2 °C 31 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
6 Sept 31.1 °C 31 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
7 Sept 30.6 °C 32 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
8 Sept 29.8 °C 27 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
9 Sept after 28.8 °C 28 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
10 Sept after 29.0 °C 31 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
11 Sept after 30.4 °C 34 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
12 Sept after 30.9 °C 36 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
13 Sept after 28.7 °C 32 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
14 Sept after 28.7 °C 30 % 36 km/h 0.2 mm High 38
15 Sept after 30.0 °C 22 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
16 Sept after 30.6 °C 26 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
17 Sept after 31.7 °C 25 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
18 Sept after 30.8 °C 28 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 21 Jul 2023
After · 15 Sept 2023

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 · 2,288Every 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 Tanzania ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Iringa fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 28 July 2023 and 8 September 2023: 43 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 42,802 hectares (428.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Iringa (43,074 ha, 2.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 31.1 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 44 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 44, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Tanzania (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.

Emergency number: 112

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
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We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy. This is not an emergency service: if there is a fire now, call 112.

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.