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Mafinga fire, 11 October 2017 Mafinga, Chama

Out · last detection 22 Oct 2017, 12:10 UTC

The fire started on 11 October 2017 in Mafinga, Zambia, and satellites saw it burning for 11 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 11,134 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 83th largest in Muchinga since 2016 (of 513 with a page). Number 33 in Zambia in 2017, of 230.

Burnt area
11,134ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
11days
11 Oct 2017 – 21 Oct 2017
Municipalities hit
2
districts
Started on
11 Oct
2017
Heat detections
363
in a single hotspot: 114 MW
Danger at start
15
Moderate · FWI index
Energy released
4.2GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

22 Oct 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 11 Oct21 Oct

How it evolved, day by day

1112131516171819202122

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

The weather it burned in

36°high
56km/h · peak gust
10%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 3.6 mm on 30 Oct.

This area had burned before

32% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 3,646 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Mafinga where it started
    8,184 ha reached on 5 Oct
    2.0 %
  2. Chama
    2,984 ha reached on 7 Oct
    0.2 %

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)
11 Oct 32.0 °C 29 % 28 km/h 2.4 mm Moderate 15
12 Oct 32.9 °C 31 % 33 km/h 3.1 mm Moderate 11
13 Oct 31.6 °C 31 % 40 km/h 0.5 mm High 25
14 Oct 26.7 °C 44 % 38 km/h 1.2 mm Moderate 15
15 Oct 31.7 °C 22 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
16 Oct 33.6 °C 11 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
17 Oct 35.1 °C 11 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
18 Oct 35.9 °C 10 % 56 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
19 Oct 33.4 °C 19 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
20 Oct 35.0 °C 14 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
21 Oct 33.9 °C 11 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
22 Oct after 31.1 °C 21 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
23 Oct after 32.0 °C 23 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
24 Oct after 33.6 °C 18 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
25 Oct after 32.2 °C 25 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
26 Oct after 34.1 °C 19 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
27 Oct after 33.9 °C 19 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
28 Oct after 31.5 °C 23 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
29 Oct after 28.7 °C 33 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
30 Oct after 26.1 °C 51 % 42 km/h 3.6 mm Low 6

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 4 Oct 2017
After · 28 Oct 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 · 363Every 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 Zambia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Mafinga fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 11 October 2017 and 21 October 2017: 11 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 11,134 hectares (111.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Mafinga (8,184 ha, 2.0 %); Chama (2,984 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 35.9 °C, humidity dropped to 10 % and gusts hit 56 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 58, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Zambia (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 4.0 (CC BY 4.0)). 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.