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Kasama fire, 12 September 2016 Kasama

Out · last detection 17 Sept 2016, 12:10 UTC

The fire started on 12 September 2016 in Kasama, Zambia, and satellites saw it burning for 6 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,136 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 583th largest in Northern since 2016 (of 628 with a page). Number 228 in Zambia in 2016, of 246.

Burnt area
3,136ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
6days
12 Sept 2016 – 17 Sept 2016
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
12 Sept
2016
Heat detections
104
in a single hotspot: 71 MW
Danger at start
48
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
1.3GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

17 Sept 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 12 Sept17 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

121314151617

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
41km/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

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

  1. Kasama where it started
    3,159 ha reached on 9 Sept
    0.3 %

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)
12 Sept 30.7 °C 18 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
13 Sept 31.4 °C 16 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
14 Sept 31.6 °C 20 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
15 Sept 32.3 °C 20 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
16 Sept 32.4 °C 21 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
17 Sept 32.9 °C 21 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
18 Sept after 33.8 °C 20 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
19 Sept after 31.5 °C 18 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
20 Sept after 29.5 °C 23 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
21 Sept after 30.5 °C 21 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
22 Sept after 31.0 °C 19 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
23 Sept after 32.0 °C 20 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
24 Sept after 32.5 °C 15 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
25 Sept after 32.6 °C 16 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
26 Sept after 32.1 °C 18 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
27 Sept after 32.2 °C 17 % 37 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 · 5 Sept 2016
After · 24 Sept 2016

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 · 104Every 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 Zambia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Kasama fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 12 September 2016 and 17 September 2016: 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 3,136 hectares (31.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Kasama (3,159 ha, 0.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 32.9 °C, humidity dropped to 16 % and gusts hit 41 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 49, class Very high.
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

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.