How long did the Kabompo fire last?

According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 10 August 2026 to 4 September 2026 (26 days). The perimeter dates it from 15 August 2026 to 4 September 2026.

How much area did it burn?

The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 8,600 hectares (86.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire only entered Kabompo (8,659 ha, 1.2 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 34.5 °C, humidity dropped to 10 % and gusts hit 47 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 54, class Extreme.

Where does this data come from?

From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Zambia (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

ZM · Zambia · 2026-08-10 → 2026-09-04

Kabompo fire, 10 August 2026 Kabompo

Out · last detection 4 Sept 2026, 11:49 UTC

The fire started on 10 August 2026 in Kabompo, Zambia, and satellites saw it burning for 26 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 8,600 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 32th largest in North-Western since 2016 (of 286 with a page). Number 104 in Zambia in 2026, of 610.

Burnt area: 8,600ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 26days; 10 Aug 2026 – 4 Sept 2026
Municipalities hit: 1; districts
Started on: 10 Aug; 2026
Heat detections: 192; in a single hotspot: 92 MW
Danger at start: 42; Very high · FWI index
Energy released: 2.6GW; sum of detected power

Play back 4 Sept 2026

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 10 Aug4 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

1013151617192021222324252627282930311234

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

The weather it burned in

34°high

47km/h · peak gust

10%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 3.2 mm on 5 Sept.

This area had burned before

26% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 879 ha in 2016, 218 ha in 2019, 978 ha in 2021, 514 ha in 2022, 207 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,274 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

Kabompo where it started

8,659 ha reached on 10 Aug

1.2 %

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)
10 Aug	30.8 °C	12 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
11 Aug	29.8 °C	24 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
12 Aug	29.8 °C	27 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
13 Aug	28.3 °C	35 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	High 38
14 Aug	28.3 °C	31 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
15 Aug	27.2 °C	24 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
16 Aug	27.4 °C	19 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38
17 Aug	28.5 °C	13 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
18 Aug	30.2 °C	12 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 47
19 Aug	30.4 °C	10 %	47 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 54
20 Aug	30.1 °C	14 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 49
21 Aug	30.6 °C	15 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 49
22 Aug	31.5 °C	13 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 49
23 Aug	31.9 °C	16 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 50
24 Aug	31.7 °C	17 %	44 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 53
25 Aug	31.9 °C	17 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 50
26 Aug	32.7 °C	16 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 53
27 Aug	31.7 °C	18 %	44 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 52
28 Aug	30.6 °C	18 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 52
29 Aug	31.2 °C	17 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 50
30 Aug	32.9 °C	16 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 49
31 Aug	34.2 °C	12 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 52
1 Sept	34.4 °C	12 %	43 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 53
2 Sept	33.7 °C	12 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 52
3 Sept	34.5 °C	12 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 50
4 Sept	34.0 °C	23 %	46 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 48
5 Sept after	26.3 °C	50 %	32 km/h	3.2 mm	Low 8

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 3 Aug 2026

After · 11 Sept 2026

Before After

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 3 September 2026 the air beside the fire reached 174 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 82: 5.5 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak174 µg/m³

Days over the guideline28 days

PM10179 µg/m³

Optical depth1.37

WHO 15

89101112131415161718192021222324252627282930311234567

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 · 192Every 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 time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Zambia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Kabompo fire last?: According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 10 August 2026 to 4 September 2026 (26 days). The perimeter dates it from 15 August 2026 to 4 September 2026.
How much area did it burn?: The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 8,600 hectares (86.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire only entered Kabompo (8,659 ha, 1.2 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 34.5 °C, humidity dropped to 10 % and gusts hit 47 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 54, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?: From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Zambia (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

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · Copernicus ↗

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?

Dates or duration Place or towns Burned area Name It was not a wildfire Same fire as another page Something else

What really happened?

Your connection to the fire (optional) Email (optional)

We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy.

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 4.0 (CC BY 4.0)). 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.

Where it burned