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MZ · Mozambique · →

Lago fire, September 2020 Lago

Out · last detection 2 Oct 2020, 10:54 UTC

The fire started on 14 September 2020 in Lago, Mozambique, and satellites saw it burning for 18 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,857 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 340th largest in Niassa since 2016 (of 567 with a page). Number 115 in Mozambique in 2020, of 193.

Burnt area
3,857ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
18days
14 Sept 2020 – 1 Oct 2020
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
14 Sept
2020
Heat detections
220
in a single hotspot: 125 MW
Danger at start
32
High · FWI index
Energy released
2.8GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

2 Oct 2020
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 14 Sept1 Oct

How it evolved, day by day

14151718192122232425262728293012

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
47km/h · peak gust
24%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 2.9 mm on 7 Oct.

This area had burned before

45% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 500 ha in 2016, 1,586 ha in 2017, 790 ha in 2018. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 1,747 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Lago where it started
    3,885 ha reached on 13 Sept
    0.6 %

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)
14 Sept 28.5 °C 36 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
15 Sept 29.9 °C 27 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
16 Sept 30.3 °C 26 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
17 Sept 30.9 °C 25 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
18 Sept 28.8 °C 30 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
19 Sept 28.1 °C 27 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
20 Sept 29.7 °C 26 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
21 Sept 29.4 °C 27 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
22 Sept 30.1 °C 24 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
23 Sept 26.2 °C 37 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
24 Sept 28.3 °C 26 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
25 Sept 29.4 °C 26 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
26 Sept 30.1 °C 27 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
27 Sept 29.8 °C 29 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
28 Sept 30.2 °C 29 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
29 Sept 30.5 °C 29 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
30 Sept 30.5 °C 29 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
1 Oct 31.2 °C 26 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
2 Oct after 32.6 °C 23 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
3 Oct after 32.3 °C 22 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
4 Oct after 33.2 °C 22 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
5 Oct after 33.4 °C 23 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
6 Oct after 30.6 °C 34 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
7 Oct after 26.9 °C 50 % 34 km/h 2.9 mm Low 8

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 7 Sept 2020
After · 8 Oct 2020

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 · 220Every 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 Mozambique ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Lago fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 14 September 2020 and 1 October 2020: 18 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 3,857 hectares (38.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Lago (3,885 ha, 0.6 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 31.2 °C, humidity dropped to 24 % and gusts hit 47 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 40, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Mozambique (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 3.0 Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY 3.0 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.