How long did the Malema fire last?

GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 3 September 2025 and 14 September 2025: 12 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 3,732 hectares (37.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire only entered Malema (3,755 ha, 0.6 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 32.2 °C, humidity dropped to 24 % and gusts hit 52 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 48, 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.

MZ · Mozambique · 2025-09-03 → 2025-09-14

Malema fire, 3 September 2025 Malema

Out · last detection 14 Sept 2025, 10:56 UTC

The fire started on 3 September 2025 in Malema, Mozambique, and satellites saw it burning for 12 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,732 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 243th largest in Nampula since 2016 (of 392 with a page). Number 211 in Mozambique in 2025, of 313.

The power measured by the satellite is low (19.4 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.

Burnt area: 3,732ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 12days; 3 Sept 2025 – 14 Sept 2025
Municipalities hit: 1; districts
Started on: 3 Sept; 2025
Heat detections: 87; in a single hotspot: 19 MW
Danger at start: 40; Very high · FWI index
Energy released: 501MW; sum of detected power

Play back 14 Sept 2025

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 3 Sept14 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

34567891011121314

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

52km/h · peak gust

24%lowest humidity

It had gone 36 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

85% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,086 ha in 2016, 745 ha in 2017, 510 ha in 2018, 1,391 ha in 2019, 1,159 ha in 2021, 486 ha in 2022, 127 ha in 2023, 465 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,167 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

Malema where it started

3,755 ha reached on 3 Sept

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)
3 Sept	29.6 °C	25 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
4 Sept	31.4 °C	24 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	High 33
5 Sept	30.8 °C	30 %	23 km/h	0.0 mm	High 33
6 Sept	31.3 °C	24 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
7 Sept	28.8 °C	29 %	52 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 48
8 Sept	30.8 °C	28 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
9 Sept	31.0 °C	33 %	31 km/h	0.1 mm	High 36
10 Sept	32.2 °C	26 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
11 Sept	30.6 °C	28 %	42 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 41
12 Sept	31.2 °C	27 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
13 Sept	30.9 °C	25 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
14 Sept	30.2 °C	32 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
15 Sept after	28.6 °C	41 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	High 29
16 Sept after	30.3 °C	34 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	High 31
17 Sept after	32.6 °C	26 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	High 38
18 Sept after	32.8 °C	29 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
19 Sept after	31.8 °C	32 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38
20 Sept after	30.9 °C	29 %	43 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
21 Sept after	31.6 °C	27 %	49 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
22 Sept after	32.8 °C	25 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
23 Sept after	31.7 °C	31 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
24 Sept after	31.1 °C	31 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 27 Aug 2025

After · 21 Sept 2025

Before After

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 13 September 2025 the air beside the fire reached 54 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 27: 1.8 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak54 µg/m³

Days over the guideline7 days

PM1055 µg/m³

Optical depth0.71

WHO 15

1234567891011121314151617

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 · 87Every 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 time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Mozambique ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Malema fire last?: GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 3 September 2025 and 14 September 2025: 12 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 3,732 hectares (37.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire only entered Malema (3,755 ha, 0.6 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 32.2 °C, humidity dropped to 24 % and gusts hit 52 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 48, 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

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · Copernicus ↗

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 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.

Where it burned