Skip to content
worldfires
en
ZM · Zambia · –

Kawambwa fire, 3 August 2022 Kawambwa

Out · last detection 15 Aug 2022, 11:08 UTC

The fire started on 3 August 2022 in Kawambwa, Zambia, and satellites saw it burning for 13 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,332 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 382th largest in Luapula since 2016 (of 447 with a page). Number 184 in Zambia in 2022, of 235.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Kawambwa · 2016Kawambwa · 2023Kawambwa · 2020Kawambwa · 2017

Burnt area
3,332ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
13days
3 Aug 2022 – 15 Aug 2022
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
3 Aug
2022
Heat detections
113
in a single hotspot: 84 MW
Danger at start
37
High · FWI index
Average daily power
216MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 3 Aug15 Aug
15 Aug 2022

How it evolved, day by day

3 Aug 2022 · 15 MW · 1 5 Aug 2022 · 50 MW · 6 6 Aug 2022 · 172 MW · 22 7 Aug 2022 · 1,353 MW · 52 8 Aug 2022 · 192 MW · 11 9 Aug 2022 · 27 MW · 4 11 Aug 2022 · 0 MW · 0 13 Aug 2022 · 32 MW · 7 14 Aug 2022 · 76 MW · 5 15 Aug 2022 · 31 MW · 5
3 Aug 7 Aug 11 Aug 14 Aug

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

The weather it burned in

31°high
42km/h · peak gust
14%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

92% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,658 ha in 2016, 2,110 ha in 2017, 1,038 ha in 2018, 951 ha in 2019, 2,391 ha in 2020, 1,121 ha in 2021. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,074 ha that had burned before.

How big is it?

10 km
It burned the equivalent of 2.1% of the area of London (33 km² against 1,583 km²).

London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).

This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.

What happened to each town

  1. Kawambwa where it started
    3,354 ha reached on 3 Aug
    0.4 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.

People and buildings inside the perimeter

GHSL 2020
Built-up area14 ha
Residents≈ 900

Inside the perimeter there were about 14 hectares of built-up land and about 900 residents (GHSL 2020, satellite-based estimate).

This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned.

Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu

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)

Started with 60 days without rain: 91 % of the area in Zambia

Day High Min. humidity Peak gust Rain Danger (FWI)
3 Aug 27.2 °C 24 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
4 Aug 27.4 °C 26 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
5 Aug 27.6 °C 24 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
6 Aug 28.2 °C 21 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
7 Aug 28.2 °C 19 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
8 Aug 28.1 °C 23 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
9 Aug 28.9 °C 20 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
10 Aug 29.1 °C 18 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
11 Aug 27.5 °C 21 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
12 Aug 28.5 °C 22 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
13 Aug 28.8 °C 26 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
14 Aug 30.4 °C 21 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
15 Aug 30.6 °C 14 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
16 Aug after 29.7 °C 16 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
17 Aug after 28.3 °C 22 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
18 Aug after 29.8 °C 18 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
19 Aug after 31.5 °C 17 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
20 Aug after 31.4 °C 21 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
21 Aug after 30.7 °C 23 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
22 Aug after 28.4 °C 27 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
23 Aug after 28.1 °C 28 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
24 Aug after 28.3 °C 28 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
25 Aug after 27.6 °C 26 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42

Its twins: fires that started in the same weather

It started with an FWI of 37.3, a minimum humidity of 24% and more than two months without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2016: 81.

FWI at the start 37.3
Minimum humidity 24 %
Days without rain 60+
this fire chosen twins rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar

Outlines of the closest twins

Kawambwa fire, August 2016
34,048 ha 29 days FWI 38.4 Min. humidity 24 % 27 km away, in 2016

First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.

See its page Compare with this fire

What happened to them

20 days
median duration
5,374 ha
median area
33 %
went past 10,000 ha
3.2 mm
rain at the end (median; 10 of 81 had it)

It stayed below its twins: 3,332 ha against a median of 5,374 ha. It lasted 13 days, against 20 days.

In 71 of 81, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 3.2 mm.

This is a bank of analogues: it shows what usually happens, not what will happen. With fewer than 15 twins we give no figures. How we calculate it

How it ended

—first rain
—no rain in ten days
42km/h · max. gust

It was considered over on 15 Aug, and not even 1 mm fell in the following ten days: it went out without rain. Twins with rain when they ended: 10 of 81, with a median of 3.2 mm.

Weather on this page: Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)

How a twin is chosen

  • Same area: fires that have already ended, less than 250 km from this one, since 2016.
  • Same start: we compare the FWI on the first day, the minimum humidity that day and the run of days without rain before it. The slider sets how much they may differ.
  • Only pages with final weather data (ERA5 reanalysis) calculated in the same way as this fire’s; agricultural and grass burns and pages with data under review are left out.
  • Fires burning at the same time as this one (a week before or after) are left out: they share the same spell of weather and do not count as a precedent.
  • They are sorted by similarity, and the outlines of the first five are drawn.

How we calculate it

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 27 Jul 2022
After · 22 Aug 2022

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 15 August 2022 the air beside the fire reached 90 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 53: 3.5 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak90 µg/m³
Days over the guideline9 days
PM10130 µg/m³
Optical depth0.61
4 Aug7 Aug10 Aug13 Aug16 Aug
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 · 113Every 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 Kawambwa fire last?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 3 August 2022 to 15 August 2022 (13 days). The perimeter dates it from 3 August 2022 to 9 August 2022.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 3,332 hectares (33.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Kawambwa (3,354 ha, 0.4 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 30.6 °C, humidity dropped to 14 % and gusts hit 42 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 47, 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.
How did the fires that started in similar weather in this area end?
Fires less than 250 km away that started since 2016 with a similar FWI, humidity and dry spell: 81. Their median duration was 20 days and their median area 5,374 ha; 33 % went past 10,000 ha. In 71 of 81, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 3.2 mm.

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

History of this page · 1 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
  1. Last day with fire: 9 August 2022 → 15 August 2022.

RSS Changes to this page With cross-checks and a citable version

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.

How we know this
  • Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery.
  • Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 3 August 2022 to 9 August 2022. 113 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
  • We have not matched this page with any official record.
  • Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
  • Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2020, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.

How we build fire pages: methodology

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.