Kapako fire, 26 September 2025 Kahenge, Kapako
The fire started on 26 September 2025 in Kapako, Namibia, and satellites saw it burning for 11 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 5,012 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.
It is the 30th largest in Kavango West since 2016 (of 152 with a page). Number 28 in Namibia in 2025, of 87.
- Burnt area
- 5,012ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 11days
- 26 Sept 2025 – 6 Oct 2025
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- constituencies
- Started on
- 26 Sept
- 2025
- Heat detections
- 175
- in a single hotspot: 37 MW
- Danger at start
- 55
- Extreme · FWI index
- Energy released
- 1.5GW
- 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. Rain came after the fire: 1.3 mm on 13 Oct.
This area had burned before
79% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 105 ha in 2017, 22 ha in 2018, 2,899 ha in 2020, 2,817 ha in 2022, 304 ha in 2023. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,981 ha that had burned before.
- 2,817 ha Kapako fire, September 2022 14,816 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,784 ha Kahenge fire, October 2020 2,942 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 105 ha Kahenge fire, August 2017 2,553 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 22 ha Kahenge fire, October 2018 2,604 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
3,712 ha reached on 30 Sept0.4 %
-
Kapako where it started1,319 ha reached on 26 Sept0.2 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 26 Sept | 35.4 °C | 18 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 55 |
| 27 Sept | 35.4 °C | 7 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 53 |
| 28 Sept | 33.3 °C | 7 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 56 |
| 29 Sept | 33.2 °C | 12 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 62 |
| 30 Sept | 35.5 °C | 10 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 61 |
| 1 Oct | 35.0 °C | 18 % | 48 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 64 |
| 2 Oct | 35.5 °C | 13 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 59 |
| 3 Oct | 36.7 °C | 11 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 56 |
| 4 Oct | 37.2 °C | 9 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 64 |
| 5 Oct | 36.5 °C | 5 % | 47 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 70 |
| 6 Oct | 37.4 °C | 8 % | 43 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 68 |
| 7 Oct after | 37.7 °C | 8 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 59 |
| 8 Oct after | 36.9 °C | 11 % | 47 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 70 |
| 9 Oct after | 36.6 °C | 12 % | 49 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 73 |
| 10 Oct after | 35.7 °C | 13 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 68 |
| 11 Oct after | 35.1 °C | 17 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 53 |
| 12 Oct after | 35.1 °C | 18 % | 29 km/h | 0.2 mm | Extreme 51 |
| 13 Oct after | 34.4 °C | 22 % | 27 km/h | 1.3 mm | High 33 |
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 26 September 2025 the air beside the fire reached 30 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 23: 1.6 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 · 175Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Kapako fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 26 September 2025 and 6 October 2025: 11 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 5,012 hectares (50.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Kahenge (3,712 ha, 0.4 %); Kapako (1,319 ha, 0.2 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 37.4 °C, humidity dropped to 5 % and gusts hit 48 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 70, class Very extreme.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Namibia (OCHA COD-AB). 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
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 OCHA COD-AB (Namibia Statistics Agency (NSA)) (Creative Commons Attribution for Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY-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.