Mashare fire, 18 September 2025 Mashare
The fire started on 18 September 2025 in Mashare, Namibia, and satellites saw it burning for 4 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,782 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 155th largest in Kavango East since 2016 (of 394 with a page). Number 44 in Namibia in 2025, of 87.
The power measured by the satellite is low (30.0 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
- 3,782ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 4days
- 18 Sept 2025 – 21 Sept 2025
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- constituencies
- Started on
- 18 Sept
- 2025
- Heat detections
- 167
- in a single hotspot: 30 MW
- Danger at start
- 63
- Extreme · FWI index
- Energy released
- 1.9GW
- sum of detected power
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
97% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,777 ha in 2016, 1,921 ha in 2018, 115 ha in 2019, 3,189 ha in 2020, 2,246 ha in 2022, 261 ha in 2023, 171 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,659 ha that had burned before.
- 3,189 ha Mashare fire, September 2020 56,605 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,246 ha Mashare fire, August 2022 2,828 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,901 ha Mashare fire, September 2018 2,698 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 261 ha Mashare fire, July 2023 2,627 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 115 ha Mashare fire, September 2019 14,917 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 31 ha Mashare fire, August 2024 44,692 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 20 ha Mashare fire, September 2018 10,119 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Mashare where it started3,807 ha reached on 18 Sept0.4 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 18 Sept | 36.7 °C | 9 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 63 |
| 19 Sept | 36.2 °C | 11 % | 54 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very extreme 75 |
| 20 Sept | 35.6 °C | 11 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 69 |
| 21 Sept | 34.3 °C | 18 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 58 |
| 22 Sept after | 31.8 °C | 26 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 23 Sept after | 34.7 °C | 15 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 50 |
| 24 Sept after | 35.4 °C | 15 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 25 Sept after | 36.3 °C | 14 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 58 |
| 26 Sept after | 34.7 °C | 19 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 60 |
| 27 Sept after | 35.1 °C | 15 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 60 |
| 28 Sept after | 33.0 °C | 8 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 58 |
| 29 Sept after | 32.4 °C | 15 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 57 |
| 30 Sept after | 34.7 °C | 12 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 60 |
| 1 Oct after | 34.0 °C | 20 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 61 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
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 · CopernicusOn 22 September 2025 the air beside the fire reached 30 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 21: 1.4 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
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 · 167Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 56,605 haMashare24 September 2020 · 11 days · 19 km away
- 20,698 haMashare27 August 2026 · 18 days · 20 km away
- 44,692 haMashare8 August 2024 · 33 days · 25 km away
- 74,641 haNdiyona16 September 2019 · 25 days · 27 km away
- 27,361 haMashare26 July 2026 · 9 days · 27 km away
- 43,677 haMashare20 August 2022 · 25 days · 31 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Mashare fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 18 September 2025 and 21 September 2025: 4 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 3,782 hectares (37.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Mashare (3,807 ha, 0.4 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 36.7 °C, humidity dropped to 9 % and gusts hit 54 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 75, class Very extreme.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Namibia (OCHA COD-AB). 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.
Report an error
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 OCHA COD-AB (Namibia Statistics Agency (NSA)) (Creative Commons Attribution for Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY-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.