Skip to content
worldfires
TZ · Tanzania · →

Iringa fire, 30 September 2026 Iringa, Manyoni

Out · last detection 6 Oct 2026, 11:51 UTC

The fire started on 30 September 2026 in Iringa, Tanzania, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,074 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 69th largest in Iringa since 2016 (of 71 with a page). Number 194 in Tanzania in 2026, of 200.

The power measured by the satellite is low (29.9 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.

Burnt area
3,074ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
7days
30 Sept 2026 – 6 Oct 2026
Municipalities hit
2
districts
Started on
30 Sept
2026
Heat detections
44
in a single hotspot: 30 MW
Danger at start
56
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
285MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

6 Oct 2026
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 30 Sept6 Oct

How it evolved, day by day

3012346

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

The weather it burned in

33°high
50km/h · peak gust
21%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

64% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 554 ha in 2016, 489 ha in 2019, 761 ha in 2020, 760 ha in 2022, 223 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 1,971 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Iringa where it started
    3,089 ha reached on 30 Sept
    0.2 %
  2. Manyoni
    0 ha
    0.0 %

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)
30 Sept 30.7 °C 24 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
1 Oct 31.3 °C 23 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
2 Oct 32.1 °C 26 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
3 Oct 33.3 °C 23 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
4 Oct 32.1 °C 26 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
5 Oct 31.7 °C 21 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 59
6 Oct 31.9 °C 29 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
7 Oct after 33.3 °C 30 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
8 Oct after 33.2 °C 19 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
9 Oct after 32.5 °C 27 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
10 Oct after 32.3 °C 27 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
11 Oct after 32.2 °C 22 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
12 Oct after 32.3 °C 24 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
13 Oct after 32.3 °C 28 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
14 Oct after 31.8 °C 31 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
15 Oct after 31.5 °C 29 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
16 Oct after 31.1 °C 28 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 23 Sept 2026
After · 13 Oct 2026

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 · Copernicus

On 9 October 2026 the air beside the fire reached 15 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak15 µg/m³
Days over the guideline0 days
PM1017 µg/m³
Optical depth0.29
282930123456789
Good Fair Moderate Poor Very poor Extremely poor

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 · 44Every 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 30 September 2026 and 6 October 2026: 7 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 3,074 hectares (30.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Iringa (3,089 ha, 0.2 %); Manyoni (0 ha, 0.0 %).
Is the Iringa fire still active?
No fire detections since 6 Oct 2026, 11:51 UTC. A lack of detections is not an official extinction.
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 33.3 °C, humidity dropped to 21 % and gusts hit 50 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 61, class Extreme.
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
What do you think is wrong?

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.