How long did the Kafue fire last?

GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 13 September 2018 and 29 September 2018: 17 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 32,071 hectares (320.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 3 municipalities: Kafue (25,394 ha, 5.6 %); Rufunsa (4,877 ha, 0.5 %); Luangwa (1,997 ha, 0.5 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 35.6 °C, humidity dropped to 16 % and gusts hit 57 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 55, 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 · 2018-09-13 → 2018-09-29

Kafue fire, September 2018 Kafue, Rufunsa, Luangwa

Out · last detection 29 Sept 2018, 23:05 UTC

The fire started on 13 September 2018 in Kafue, Zambia, and satellites saw it burning for 17 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 32,071 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.

It is the largest fire in Lusaka since 2016 (of 77 with a page). Number 4 in Zambia in 2018, of 204.

Burnt area: 32,071ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 17days; 13 Sept 2018 – 29 Sept 2018
Municipalities hit: 3; districts
Started on: 13 Sept; 2018
Heat detections: 1,725; in a single hotspot: 110 MW
Danger at start: 41; Very high · FWI index
Energy released: 9.1GW; sum of detected power

Play back 29 Sept 2018

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 13 Sept29 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

1314151617181920212223242526272829

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

The weather it burned in

36°high

57km/h · peak gust

16%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

55% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 17,345 ha in 2016, 1,044 ha in 2017.

What happened to each town

Kafue where it started

25,394 ha reached on 11 Sept

5.6 %
Rufunsa

4,877 ha reached on 11 Sept

0.5 %
Luangwa

1,997 ha reached on 15 Sept

0.5 %

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)
13 Sept	32.2 °C	20 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 41
14 Sept	33.9 °C	17 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 45
15 Sept	33.5 °C	19 %	45 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 49
16 Sept	34.1 °C	19 %	44 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 49
17 Sept	34.0 °C	20 %	46 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 51
18 Sept	35.2 °C	16 %	44 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 51
19 Sept	34.7 °C	16 %	48 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 54
20 Sept	33.9 °C	17 %	48 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 54
21 Sept	32.5 °C	26 %	53 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 52
22 Sept	31.9 °C	22 %	55 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 54
23 Sept	31.0 °C	22 %	53 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 54
24 Sept	31.9 °C	27 %	50 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 50
25 Sept	32.9 °C	24 %	57 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 55
26 Sept	34.3 °C	19 %	47 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 50
27 Sept	35.6 °C	22 %	48 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 50
28 Sept	34.4 °C	23 %	50 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 52
29 Sept	34.5 °C	19 %	47 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 50
30 Sept after	30.3 °C	30 %	69 km/h	0.1 mm	Extreme 55
1 Oct after	27.2 °C	33 %	52 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
2 Oct after	29.3 °C	30 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
3 Oct after	32.6 °C	26 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
4 Oct after	33.4 °C	23 %	54 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 50
5 Oct after	29.7 °C	34 %	55 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 47
6 Oct after	30.0 °C	30 %	47 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
7 Oct after	30.8 °C	22 %	50 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
8 Oct after	29.8 °C	17 %	50 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 50
9 Oct after	29.4 °C	24 %	49 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 50

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 6 Sept 2018

After · 6 Oct 2018

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.

Detections table · 1,725Every 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 Kafue fire last?: GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 13 September 2018 and 29 September 2018: 17 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 32,071 hectares (320.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 3 municipalities: Kafue (25,394 ha, 5.6 %); Rufunsa (4,877 ha, 0.5 %); Luangwa (1,997 ha, 0.5 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 35.6 °C, humidity dropped to 16 % and gusts hit 57 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 55, 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.

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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 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