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Mansa fire, 27 August 2023 Mansa, Lupososhi, Chifunabuli

Out · last detection 19 Sept 2023, 11:08 UTC

The fire started on 27 August 2023 in Mansa, Zambia, and satellites saw it burning for 23 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 133,309 hectares from heat detections, spread across 4 municipalities.

This page is probably a fire complex, not a single fire. GWIS merges into one perimeter the fires that touch over weeks, which in large burning seasons can join dozens of separate fires. The total area is reliable; the origin and dates refer to the whole complex.

It is the 12th largest in Luapula since 2016 (of 533 with a page). The largest in Zambia in 2023, of 165.

Burnt area
133,309ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
23days
27 Aug 2023 – 18 Sept 2023
Municipalities hit
4
districts
Started on
27 Aug
2023
Heat detections
6,596
in a single hotspot: 260 MW
Danger at start
56
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
76.3GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

19 Sept 2023
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 27 Aug18 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

272829303112345678910111213141516171819

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
68km/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

100% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 96,566 ha in 2016, 92,875 ha in 2017, 65,209 ha in 2018, 90,054 ha in 2019, 95,100 ha in 2020, 95,276 ha in 2021, 43,989 ha in 2022. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 133,123 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Mansa where it started
    85,784 ha reached on 21 Aug
    11 %
  2. Lupososhi
    42,696 ha reached on 24 Aug
    10 %
  3. Chifunabuli
    3,236 ha reached on 22 Aug
    1.0 %
  4. Chipili
    2,450 ha reached on 22 Aug
    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)
27 Aug 31.1 °C 16 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
28 Aug 24.8 °C 39 % 68 km/h 0.1 mm Extreme 52
29 Aug 22.3 °C 45 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
30 Aug 25.2 °C 38 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
31 Aug 27.4 °C 36 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
1 Sept 28.7 °C 32 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
2 Sept 29.4 °C 24 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
3 Sept 30.2 °C 26 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
4 Sept 29.2 °C 26 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
5 Sept 29.7 °C 28 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
6 Sept 31.0 °C 29 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
7 Sept 30.8 °C 25 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
8 Sept 30.2 °C 24 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
9 Sept 29.4 °C 22 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
10 Sept 29.3 °C 27 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
11 Sept 31.8 °C 24 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
12 Sept 31.8 °C 25 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
13 Sept 29.7 °C 31 % 64 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
14 Sept 28.3 °C 34 % 57 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
15 Sept 29.3 °C 31 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
16 Sept 31.5 °C 25 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
17 Sept 32.0 °C 22 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
18 Sept 31.3 °C 19 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
19 Sept after 30.6 °C 24 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
20 Sept after 31.7 °C 19 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
21 Sept after 31.8 °C 16 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
22 Sept after 31.1 °C 23 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
23 Sept after 31.8 °C 24 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
24 Sept after 32.2 °C 26 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
25 Sept after 33.0 °C 24 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
26 Sept after 32.9 °C 24 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
27 Sept after 31.1 °C 39 % 25 km/h 0.9 mm High 23
28 Sept after 31.8 °C 27 % 29 km/h 0.3 mm High 34

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 20 Aug 2023
After · 25 Sept 2023

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 · 6,596Every 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 Mansa fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 27 August 2023 and 18 September 2023: 23 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 133,309 hectares (1,333.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 4 municipalities: Mansa (85,784 ha, 11 %); Lupososhi (42,696 ha, 10 %); Chifunabuli (3,236 ha, 1.0 %); Chipili (2,450 ha, 0.6 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 32.0 °C, humidity dropped to 16 % and gusts hit 68 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 57, 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.