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Larde fire, 30 August 2026 Larde, Moma

Out · last detection 7 Sept 2026, 10:51 UTC

The fire started on 30 August 2026 in Larde, Mozambique, and satellites saw it burning for 9 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,538 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 166th largest in Nampula since 2016 (of 392 with a page). Number 244 in Mozambique in 2026, of 532.

Burnt area
4,538ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
9days
30 Aug 2026 – 7 Sept 2026
Municipalities hit
2
districts
Started on
30 Aug
2026
Heat detections
69
in a single hotspot: 38 MW
Danger at start
24
High · FWI index
Energy released
485MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

7 Sept 2026
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 30 Aug7 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

31124567

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

The weather it burned in

34°high
47km/h · peak gust
29%lowest humidity

It had gone 9 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 2.4 mm on 9 Sept.

This area had burned before

98% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 885 ha in 2016, 2,023 ha in 2017, 834 ha in 2018, 1,241 ha in 2019, 1,063 ha in 2020, 1,352 ha in 2021, 1,937 ha in 2022, 1,483 ha in 2023, 1,730 ha in 2024, 3,082 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 4,429 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Larde where it started
    3,407 ha reached on 31 Aug
    1.8 %
  2. Moma
    1,159 ha reached on 31 Aug
    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)
30 Aug 30.2 °C 43 % 35 km/h 0.4 mm High 24
31 Aug 31.0 °C 39 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
1 Sept 29.5 °C 47 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
2 Sept 32.1 °C 35 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
3 Sept 31.7 °C 37 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
4 Sept 33.6 °C 29 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
5 Sept 31.7 °C 38 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
6 Sept 32.4 °C 37 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
7 Sept 29.7 °C 42 % 47 km/h 0.3 mm High 36
8 Sept after 27.0 °C 48 % 40 km/h 0.7 mm High 24
9 Sept after 27.7 °C 60 % 30 km/h 2.4 mm Low 7

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 23 Aug 2026
After · 14 Sept 2026

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 6 September 2026 the air beside the fire reached 61 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 30: 2.0 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak61 µg/m³
Days over the guideline8 days
PM1063 µg/m³
Optical depth0.59
2829303112345678910
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 · 69Every 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 Larde fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 30 August 2026 and 7 September 2026: 9 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 4,538 hectares (45.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Larde (3,407 ha, 1.8 %); Moma (1,159 ha, 0.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 33.6 °C, humidity dropped to 29 % 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.