Lugela fire, 6 October 2021 Namarrói, Lugela
The fire started on 6 October 2021 in Lugela, Mozambique, and satellites saw it burning for 28 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 7,441 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.
It is the 227th largest in Zambézia since 2016 (of 839 with a page). Number 34 in Mozambique in 2021, of 233.
Compare with…
- Burnt area
- 7,441ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 28days
- 6 Oct 2021 – 2 Nov 2021
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- districts
- Started on
- 6 Oct
- 2021
- Heat detections
- 434
- in a single hotspot: 85 MW
- Danger at start
- 28
- High · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 218MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone 13 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 4.4 mm on 11 Nov.
This area had burned before
99% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 6,541 ha in 2016, 6,091 ha in 2017, 824 ha in 2018, 5,106 ha in 2019, 6,244 ha in 2020. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 7,336 ha that had burned before.
- 6,541 ha Namarrói fire, September 2016 77,917 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 6,166 ha Lugela fire, September 2020 111,849 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 5,798 ha Namarrói fire, October 2017 45,014 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3,723 ha Namarrói fire, September 2019 13,251 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
Berlin boundary: geoBoundaries · Federal Agency for Cartography and Geodesy (dl-de/by-2-0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
7,142 ha reached on 8 Oct2.3 %
-
Lugela where it started344 ha reached on 7 Oct0.1 %
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 2020Inside the perimeter there were about 3.7 hectares of built-up land and about 500 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)
| Day | High | Min. humidity | Peak gust | Rain | Danger (FWI) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 Oct | 31.5 °C | 33 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 7 Oct | 28.3 °C | 39 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 8 Oct | 27.3 °C | 35 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 9 Oct | 32.3 °C | 22 % | 19 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 10 Oct | 34.0 °C | 23 % | 57 km/h | 0.5 mm | Very high 44 |
| 11 Oct | 25.3 °C | 58 % | 45 km/h | 5.9 mm | Very low 4 |
| 12 Oct | 24.5 °C | 47 % | 39 km/h | 2.9 mm | Very low 5 |
| 13 Oct | 28.5 °C | 38 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 11 |
| 14 Oct | 32.1 °C | 28 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 15 Oct | 34.2 °C | 27 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 16 Oct | 34.4 °C | 29 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 17 Oct | 34.2 °C | 31 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 18 Oct | 33.4 °C | 31 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 19 Oct | 31.6 °C | 26 % | 46 km/h | 0.4 mm | High 34 |
| 20 Oct | 25.1 °C | 65 % | 36 km/h | 7.3 mm | Very low 2 |
| 21 Oct | 25.9 °C | 51 % | 31 km/h | 0.3 mm | Low 5 |
| 22 Oct | 31.4 °C | 35 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 16 |
| 23 Oct | 35.1 °C | 26 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 24 Oct | 36.8 °C | 25 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 25 Oct | 33.1 °C | 30 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 26 Oct | 32.5 °C | 38 % | 40 km/h | 0.3 mm | High 28 |
| 27 Oct | 31.7 °C | 37 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 28 Oct | 27.3 °C | 43 % | 44 km/h | 0.9 mm | Moderate 19 |
| 29 Oct | 27.4 °C | 36 % | 36 km/h | 0.1 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 30 Oct | 33.1 °C | 28 % | 19 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 31 Oct | 35.5 °C | 28 % | 35 km/h | 0.2 mm | High 31 |
| 1 Nov | 35.0 °C | 32 % | 27 km/h | 0.2 mm | High 27 |
| 2 Nov | 37.3 °C | 21 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 3 Nov after | 36.4 °C | 27 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 4 Nov after | 35.9 °C | 24 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 5 Nov after | 35.1 °C | 27 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 6 Nov after | 35.9 °C | 23 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 7 Nov after | 37.3 °C | 17 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 8 Nov after | 37.7 °C | 17 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 9 Nov after | 38.8 °C | 19 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 10 Nov after | 37.2 °C | 24 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 53 |
| 11 Nov after | 33.3 °C | 43 % | 30 km/h | 4.4 mm | Low 9 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
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 · 434Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 111,849 haLugela6 September 2020 · 39 days · 17 km away
- 57,746 haLugela 5 October 2026 · 28 days · 17 km away
- 173,378 haLugelaSeptember 2022 · 48 days · 18 km away
- 52,686 haNamarrói6 September 2018 · 31 days · 23 km away
- 219,876 haNamarrói16 August 2026 · 44 days · 26 km away
- 74,073 haLugela10 August 2026 · 36 days · 28 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Lugela fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 6 October 2021 to 2 November 2021 (28 days). The perimeter dates it from 13 October 2021 to 26 October 2021.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 7,441 hectares (74.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Namarrói (7,142 ha, 2.3 %); Lugela (344 ha, 0.1 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 37.3 °C, humidity dropped to 21 % and gusts hit 57 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 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
History of this page · 2 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
- Last day with fire: 26 October 2021 → 2 November 2021.
- Start date: 13 October 2021 → 6 October 2021.
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
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 13 October 2021 to 26 October 2021. 434 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.
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.