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Luquembo fire, June 2017 Luquembo

Out · last detection 26 Jun 2017, 12:23 UTC

The fire started on 20 June 2017 in Luquembo, Angola, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 5,877 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 74th largest in Malanje since 2016 (of 127 with a page). Number 103 in Angola in 2017, of 158.

Burnt area
5,877ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
7days
20 Jun 2017 – 26 Jun 2017
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
20 Jun
2017
Heat detections
240
in a single hotspot: 152 MW
Danger at start
40
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
2.8GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

26 Jun 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 20 Jun26 Jun

How it evolved, day by day

20212223242526

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

The weather it burned in

30°high
44km/h · peak gust
21%lowest humidity

It had gone 53 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

45% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,703 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Luquembo where it started
    5,906 ha reached on 20 Jun
    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)
20 Jun 29.2 °C 25 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
21 Jun 27.9 °C 23 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
22 Jun 29.0 °C 25 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
23 Jun 27.5 °C 23 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
24 Jun 28.5 °C 23 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
25 Jun 29.6 °C 23 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
26 Jun 30.4 °C 21 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
27 Jun after 30.1 °C 24 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
28 Jun after 29.3 °C 19 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
29 Jun after 28.2 °C 21 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
30 Jun after 29.4 °C 20 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
1 Jul after 29.8 °C 15 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
2 Jul after 29.4 °C 17 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
3 Jul after 29.9 °C 17 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
4 Jul after 28.0 °C 20 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
5 Jul after 28.3 °C 16 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
6 Jul after 26.9 °C 19 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 13 Jun 2017
After · 3 Jul 2017

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 · 240Every 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 Luquembo fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 20 June 2017 and 26 June 2017: 7 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 5,877 hectares (58.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Luquembo (5,906 ha, 0.6 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 30.4 °C, humidity dropped to 21 % and gusts hit 44 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 45, 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.