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Manyoni fire, 30 July 2020 Manyoni

Out · last detection 5 Aug 2020, 10:43 UTC

The fire started on 30 July 2020 in Manyoni, Tanzania, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,661 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 87th largest in Singida since 2016 (of 124 with a page). Number 124 in Tanzania in 2020, of 187.

Burnt area
3,661ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
7days
30 Jul 2020 – 5 Aug 2020
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
30 Jul
2020
Heat detections
110
in a single hotspot: 42 MW
Danger at start
30
High · FWI index
Energy released
549MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

5 Aug 2020
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 30 Jul5 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

30311235

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

The weather it burned in

28°high
41km/h · peak gust
30%lowest humidity

It had gone 19 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

33% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 130 ha in 2016, 574 ha in 2018, 631 ha in 2019. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 1,225 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Manyoni where it started
    3,689 ha reached on 27 Jul
    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)
30 Jul 28.0 °C 36 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
31 Jul 28.3 °C 36 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
1 Aug 27.6 °C 38 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
2 Aug 26.4 °C 32 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
3 Aug 27.4 °C 30 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
4 Aug 27.2 °C 36 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
5 Aug 28.1 °C 37 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
6 Aug after 29.6 °C 33 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
7 Aug after 29.7 °C 29 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
8 Aug after 27.5 °C 34 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
9 Aug after 26.8 °C 35 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
10 Aug after 27.4 °C 36 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
11 Aug after 28.1 °C 36 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
12 Aug after 27.6 °C 40 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
13 Aug after 27.8 °C 39 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
14 Aug after 28.5 °C 33 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
15 Aug after 27.7 °C 34 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 34

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 23 Jul 2020
After · 12 Aug 2020

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 · 110Every 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 30 July 2020 and 5 August 2020: 7 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 3,661 hectares (36.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Manyoni (3,689 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 28.3 °C, humidity dropped to 30 % and gusts hit 41 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 34, class 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.