How long did the Mavinga fire last?

GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 29 August 2018 and 21 September 2018: 24 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 13,275 hectares (132.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire only entered Mavinga (13,340 ha, 0.3 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 37.2 °C, humidity dropped to 6 % and gusts hit 51 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 70, class Very extreme.

Where does this data come from?

From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Angola (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

AO · Angola · 2018-08-29 → 2018-09-21

Mavinga fire, 29 August 2018 Mavinga

Out · last detection 22 Sept 2018, 12:28 UTC

The fire started on 29 August 2018 in Mavinga, Angola, and satellites saw it burning for 24 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 13,275 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 105th largest in Cuando Cubango since 2016 (of 659 with a page). Number 7 in Angola in 2018, of 100.

Burnt area: 13,275ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 24days; 29 Aug 2018 – 21 Sept 2018
Municipalities hit: 1; municipalities
Started on: 29 Aug; 2018
Heat detections: 608; in a single hotspot: 153 MW
Danger at start: 50; Very high · FWI index
Energy released: 5.1GW; sum of detected power

Play back 22 Sept 2018

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 29 Aug21 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

29303112345678910111213141516171819202122

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

The weather it burned in

37°high

51km/h · peak gust

6%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

14% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,852 ha in 2016.

1,852 ha Mavinga fire, September 2016 7,795 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire

What happened to each town

Mavinga where it started

13,340 ha reached on 23 Aug

0.3 %

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)
23 Aug	33.1 °C	13 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 50
24 Aug	33.4 °C	15 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 48
25 Aug	33.2 °C	15 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
26 Aug	33.1 °C	16 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 48
27 Aug	31.9 °C	14 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 52
28 Aug	30.2 °C	12 %	47 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 60
29 Aug	31.2 °C	14 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 54
30 Aug	30.8 °C	16 %	43 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 57
31 Aug	30.9 °C	14 %	42 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 56
1 Sept	31.1 °C	11 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 55
2 Sept	32.1 °C	10 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 47
3 Sept	33.4 °C	11 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 49
4 Sept	33.8 °C	14 %	51 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 64
5 Sept	34.4 °C	11 %	50 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 64
6 Sept	33.5 °C	17 %	43 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 57
7 Sept	32.6 °C	15 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 52
8 Sept	32.7 °C	17 %	22 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
9 Sept	30.3 °C	15 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 55
10 Sept	30.2 °C	10 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 52
11 Sept	31.4 °C	6 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 52
12 Sept	33.0 °C	6 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 52
13 Sept	34.0 °C	9 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 55
14 Sept	34.0 °C	8 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 58
15 Sept	35.1 °C	11 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 60
16 Sept	35.7 °C	10 %	43 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 63
17 Sept	35.7 °C	10 %	45 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 65
18 Sept	36.8 °C	10 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 58
19 Sept	37.2 °C	9 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 58
20 Sept	34.9 °C	10 %	42 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 64
21 Sept	35.5 °C	10 %	42 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 64
22 Sept after	34.8 °C	12 %	50 km/h	0.0 mm	Very extreme 70
23 Sept after	35.2 °C	14 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 59
24 Sept after	35.8 °C	13 %	45 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 65
25 Sept after	34.6 °C	18 %	36 km/h	0.1 mm	Extreme 50
26 Sept after	34.5 °C	20 %	36 km/h	0.9 mm	Very high 41
27 Sept after	35.5 °C	16 %	31 km/h	0.6 mm	Very high 44
28 Sept after	35.8 °C	14 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 54
29 Sept after	36.1 °C	14 %	48 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 63
30 Sept after	33.4 °C	16 %	57 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 66
1 Oct after	32.6 °C	18 %	48 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 60
2 Oct after	32.6 °C	15 %	46 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 59

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 22 Aug 2018

After · 28 Sept 2018

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.

Detections table · 608Every 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 Angola ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Mavinga fire last?: GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 29 August 2018 and 21 September 2018: 24 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 13,275 hectares (132.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire only entered Mavinga (13,340 ha, 0.3 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 37.2 °C, humidity dropped to 6 % and gusts hit 51 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 70, class Very extreme.
Where does this data come from?: From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Angola (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 (Public Domain). 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