Iringa fire, 9 September 2025 Mbarali, Iringa, Chunya
The fire started on 9 September 2025 in Iringa, Tanzania, and satellites saw it burning for 6 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 6,113 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.
It is the 25th largest in Iringa since 2016 (of 71 with a page). Number 45 in Tanzania in 2025, of 161.
- Burnt area
- 6,113ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 6days
- 9 Sept 2025 – 14 Sept 2025
- Municipalities hit
- 3
- districts
- Started on
- 9 Sept
- 2025
- Heat detections
- 109
- in a single hotspot: 151 MW
- Danger at start
- 38
- High · FWI index
- Energy released
- 2.0GW
- 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.
The weather it burned in
It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
100% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,394 ha in 2016, 4,131 ha in 2017, 1,401 ha in 2018, 3,532 ha in 2019, 3,613 ha in 2020, 1,430 ha in 2021, 2,100 ha in 2022, 1,922 ha in 2023, 3,356 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 6,095 ha that had burned before.
- 4,131 ha Iringa fire, August 2017 39,206 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,532 ha Iringa fire, July 2019 18,155 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,354 ha Mbarali fire, September 2024 10,855 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,879 ha Chunya fire, September 2020 9,707 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,165 ha Mbarali fire, September 2016 3,163 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 811 ha Mbarali fire, September 2021 140,758 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 665 ha Mbarali fire, October 2020 16,427 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 619 ha Mbarali fire, September 2021 4,349 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
2,927 ha reached on 12 Sept0.2 %
-
Iringa where it started2,905 ha reached on 10 Sept0.2 %
-
316 ha reached on 12 Sept0.0 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 9 Sept | 29.5 °C | 30 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 38 |
| 10 Sept | 30.8 °C | 24 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 11 Sept | 30.2 °C | 20 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 12 Sept | 28.5 °C | 20 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 13 Sept | 28.9 °C | 18 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 14 Sept | 31.1 °C | 22 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 15 Sept after | 29.9 °C | 31 % | 27 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 33 |
| 16 Sept after | 28.8 °C | 31 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 17 Sept after | 29.0 °C | 30 % | 26 km/h | 0.2 mm | High 32 |
| 18 Sept after | 30.4 °C | 26 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 35 |
| 19 Sept after | 30.4 °C | 27 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 20 Sept after | 29.3 °C | 24 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 21 Sept after | 29.4 °C | 24 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 22 Sept after | 29.3 °C | 29 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 23 Sept after | 30.0 °C | 23 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 24 Sept after | 29.6 °C | 26 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
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.
The smoke
CAMS · CopernicusOn 14 September 2025 the air beside the fire reached 34 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 29: 1.9 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
Particles from the Copernicus CAMS model at the centre of the perimeter; these are not measurements in each town. The pale bar is the worst hour, the solid one the daily average.
Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS)
Detections table · 109Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 113,445 haIringaSeptember 2018 · 35 days · 18 km away
- 39,206 haIringa15 August 2017 · 34 days · 19 km away
- 42,802 haIringa28 July 2023 · 43 days · 30 km away
- 140,758 haMbarali4 September 2021 · 45 days · 31 km away
- 138,240 haIringaAugust 2016 · 37 days · 31 km away
- 97,386 haIringa7 July 2019 · 26 days · 38 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Iringa fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 9 September 2025 and 14 September 2025: 6 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 6,113 hectares (61.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 3 municipalities: Mbarali (2,927 ha, 0.2 %); Iringa (2,905 ha, 0.2 %); Chunya (316 ha, 0.0 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 31.1 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 38 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 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
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.