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Mavinga fire, August 2022 Mavinga

Out · last detection 13 Sept 2022, 12:03 UTC

The fire started on 31 August 2022 in Mavinga, Angola, and satellites saw it burning for 13 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 6,841 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 384th largest in Cuando Cubango since 2016 (of 659 with a page). Number 65 in Angola in 2022, of 143.

Burnt area
6,841ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
13days
31 Aug 2022 – 12 Sept 2022
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
31 Aug
2022
Heat detections
242
in a single hotspot: 595 MW
Danger at start
51
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
5.5GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

13 Sept 2022
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 31 Aug12 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

31123456789101213

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

The weather it burned in

34°high
44km/h · peak gust
11%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

83% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,306 ha in 2016, 928 ha in 2017, 2,844 ha in 2018, 415 ha in 2019, 2,448 ha in 2020. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 5,667 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Mavinga where it started
    6,901 ha reached on 30 Aug
    0.2 %

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)
31 Aug 30.7 °C 19 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
1 Sept 28.7 °C 20 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
2 Sept 27.9 °C 19 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
3 Sept 27.7 °C 19 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
4 Sept 31.0 °C 19 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
5 Sept 32.7 °C 18 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
6 Sept 34.3 °C 12 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
7 Sept 33.6 °C 14 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
8 Sept 32.4 °C 15 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
9 Sept 32.2 °C 17 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
10 Sept 32.2 °C 11 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
11 Sept 32.7 °C 14 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
12 Sept 33.7 °C 11 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
13 Sept after 33.2 °C 13 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
14 Sept after 32.2 °C 18 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
15 Sept after 30.7 °C 15 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
16 Sept after 30.5 °C 15 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
17 Sept after 31.5 °C 16 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
18 Sept after 33.7 °C 13 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
19 Sept after 34.5 °C 17 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
20 Sept after 30.1 °C 15 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
21 Sept after 31.7 °C 12 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
22 Sept after 33.4 °C 9 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 24 Aug 2022
After · 19 Sept 2022

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 · 242Every 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 Angola ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Mavinga fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 31 August 2022 and 12 September 2022: 13 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 6,841 hectares (68.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Mavinga (6,901 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 34.3 °C, humidity dropped to 11 % and gusts hit 44 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 58, class 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

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.