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Luquembo fire, 3 July 2019 Luquembo, Cangandala

Out · last detection 13 Jul 2019, 12:17 UTC

The fire started on 3 July 2019 in Luquembo, Angola, and satellites saw it burning for 10 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 6,025 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 71th largest in Malanje since 2016 (of 127 with a page). Number 140 in Angola in 2019, of 207.

Burnt area
6,025ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
10days
3 Jul 2019 – 12 Jul 2019
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
3 Jul
2019
Heat detections
223
in a single hotspot: 107 MW
Danger at start
42
Very high · FWI index
Average daily power
257MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

13 Jul 2019
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 3 Jul12 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

3 Jul 2019 · 102 MW · 8 5 Jul 2019 · 570 MW · 20 6 Jul 2019 · 589 MW · 39 7 Jul 2019 · 25 MW · 4 8 Jul 2019 · 699 MW · 41 9 Jul 2019 · 337 MW · 30 10 Jul 2019 · 8 MW · 5 11 Jul 2019 · 34 MW · 6 12 Jul 2019 · 182 MW · 22 13 Jul 2019 · 26 MW · 2
3 Jul 6 Jul 8 Jul 10 Jul 12 Jul

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
46km/h · peak gust
16%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

57% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 342 ha in 2016, 2,221 ha in 2017, 1,614 ha in 2018. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,425 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Luquembo where it started
    5,312 ha reached on 26 Jun
    0.5 %
  2. Cangandala
    739 ha reached on 26 Jun
    0.1 %

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)
3 Jul 29.5 °C 24 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
4 Jul 30.1 °C 23 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
5 Jul 29.2 °C 27 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
6 Jul 29.4 °C 21 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
7 Jul 29.3 °C 19 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
8 Jul 28.8 °C 17 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
9 Jul 29.1 °C 17 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
10 Jul 29.2 °C 18 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
11 Jul 30.8 °C 19 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
12 Jul 30.5 °C 16 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
13 Jul after 28.9 °C 21 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
14 Jul after 29.3 °C 30 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
15 Jul after 30.1 °C 19 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
16 Jul after 30.6 °C 19 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
17 Jul after 28.9 °C 21 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
18 Jul after 29.4 °C 21 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
19 Jul after 29.7 °C 16 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
20 Jul after 28.9 °C 16 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
21 Jul after 30.3 °C 17 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
22 Jul after 29.5 °C 18 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 26 Jun 2019
After · 19 Jul 2019

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 · 223Every 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 3 July 2019 and 12 July 2019: 10 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 6,025 hectares (60.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Luquembo (5,312 ha, 0.5 %); Cangandala (739 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 30.8 °C, humidity dropped to 16 % and gusts hit 46 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 46, 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.