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Libolo (Calulo) fire, 18 July 2026 Libolo (Calulo)

Out · last detection 1 Aug 2026, 12:27 UTC

The fire started on 18 July 2026 in Libolo (Calulo), Angola, and satellites saw it burning for 14 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 16,031 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 10th largest in Cuanza Sul since 2016 (of 79 with a page). Number 80 in Angola in 2026, of 485.

Burnt area
16,031ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
14days
18 Jul 2026 – 31 Jul 2026
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
18 Jul
2026
Heat detections
278
in a single hotspot: 233 MW
Danger at start
40
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
4.4GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

1 Aug 2026
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 18 Jul31 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

181920212223242526272930311

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

The weather it burned in

32°high
39km/h · peak gust
14%lowest humidity

It had gone 58 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

89% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 3,440 ha in 2016, 5,716 ha in 2017, 2,437 ha in 2018, 6,057 ha in 2019, 4,372 ha in 2020, 1,754 ha in 2021, 4,090 ha in 2022, 4,891 ha in 2023, 1,720 ha in 2024, 2,385 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 14,226 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Libolo (Calulo) where it started
    16,141 ha reached on 17 Jul
    2.7 %

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)
17 Jul 28.8 °C 17 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
18 Jul 27.2 °C 21 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
19 Jul 29.3 °C 18 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
20 Jul 26.0 °C 42 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
21 Jul 25.8 °C 45 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
22 Jul 29.4 °C 31 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
23 Jul 31.9 °C 18 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
24 Jul 31.6 °C 17 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
25 Jul 31.2 °C 14 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
26 Jul 29.9 °C 20 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
27 Jul 29.3 °C 25 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
28 Jul 28.4 °C 30 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
29 Jul 28.9 °C 20 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
30 Jul 28.2 °C 29 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
31 Jul 30.0 °C 25 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
1 Aug after 27.7 °C 37 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
2 Aug after 28.2 °C 33 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
3 Aug after 28.4 °C 28 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
4 Aug after 26.5 °C 46 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
5 Aug after 27.2 °C 41 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
6 Aug after 28.5 °C 33 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
7 Aug after 30.2 °C 22 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
8 Aug after 29.6 °C 28 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
9 Aug after 28.7 °C 32 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
10 Aug after 29.6 °C 29 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
11 Aug after 29.4 °C 30 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
12 Aug after 30.8 °C 17 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 11 Jul 2026
After · 7 Aug 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 26 July 2026 the air beside the fire reached 306 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 175: 12 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak306 µg/m³
Days over the guideline19 days
PM10313 µg/m³
Optical depth1.74
16171819202122232425262728293031123
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 · 278Every 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 Angola ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Libolo (Calulo) fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 18 July 2026 and 31 July 2026: 14 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 16,031 hectares (160.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Libolo (Calulo) (16,141 ha, 2.7 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 31.9 °C, humidity dropped to 14 % and gusts hit 39 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 44, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Angola (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 (Public Domain). 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.