Skip to content
worldfires
TZ · Tanzania · →

Manyoni fire, September 2018 Manyoni, Chunya

Out · last detection 6 Sept 2018, 10:49 UTC

The fire started on 4 September 2018 in Manyoni, Tanzania, and satellites saw it burning for 3 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,648 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 88th largest in Singida since 2016 (of 124 with a page). Number 43 in Tanzania in 2018, of 72.

Burnt area
3,648ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
3days
4 Sept 2018 – 6 Sept 2018
Municipalities hit
2
districts
Started on
4 Sept
2018
Heat detections
102
in a single hotspot: 97 MW
Danger at start
45
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
1.2GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

6 Sept 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 4 Sept6 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

456

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
54km/h · peak gust
27%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

59% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,020 ha in 2016, 466 ha in 2017. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,155 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Manyoni where it started
    3,581 ha reached on 4 Sept
    0.1 %
  2. Chunya
    99 ha reached on 6 Sept
    0.0 %

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)
4 Sept 29.7 °C 27 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
5 Sept 28.3 °C 32 % 49 km/h 0.2 mm Very high 45
6 Sept 28.7 °C 33 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
7 Sept after 29.5 °C 27 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
8 Sept after 30.2 °C 29 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
9 Sept after 30.7 °C 25 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
10 Sept after 29.9 °C 30 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
11 Sept after 30.1 °C 30 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
12 Sept after 30.0 °C 27 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
13 Sept after 31.3 °C 19 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
14 Sept after 32.3 °C 22 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
15 Sept after 31.5 °C 24 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
16 Sept after 32.3 °C 20 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 28 Aug 2018
After · 13 Sept 2018

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 · 102Every 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 Tanzania ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Manyoni fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 4 September 2018 and 6 September 2018: 3 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 3,648 hectares (36.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Manyoni (3,581 ha, 0.1 %); Chunya (99 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 29.7 °C, humidity dropped to 27 % and gusts hit 54 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 Tanzania (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.

Emergency number: 112

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.

Report an error
What do you think is wrong?

We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy. This is not an emergency service: if there is a fire now, call 112.

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.