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Mavinga fire, 5 July 2023 Mavinga

Out · last detection 25 Jul 2023, 11:57 UTC

The fire started on 5 July 2023 in Mavinga, Angola, and satellites saw it burning for 22 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 15,562 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 76th largest in Cuando Cubango since 2016 (of 658 with a page). Number 9 in Angola in 2023, of 158.

Burnt area
15,562ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
22days
5 Jul 2023 – 26 Jul 2023
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
5 Jul
2023
Heat detections
615
in a single hotspot: 160 MW
Danger at start
43
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
4.4GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

25 Jul 2023
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 5 Jul26 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

5678910111213141516171819202122232425

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
47km/h · peak gust
17%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

57% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 3,654 ha in 2016, 765 ha in 2017, 2,078 ha in 2018, 2,816 ha in 2019, 208 ha in 2020, 890 ha in 2021, 525 ha in 2022. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 8,885 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Mavinga where it started
    15,710 ha reached on 5 Jul
    0.4 %

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)
5 Jul 25.2 °C 26 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
6 Jul 25.3 °C 21 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
7 Jul 25.6 °C 23 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
8 Jul 24.8 °C 22 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
9 Jul 25.2 °C 19 % 17 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
10 Jul 17.6 °C 18 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
11 Jul 18.4 °C 19 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
12 Jul 20.2 °C 34 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
13 Jul 21.9 °C 24 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
14 Jul 24.4 °C 28 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
15 Jul 26.2 °C 21 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
16 Jul 24.4 °C 21 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
17 Jul 24.3 °C 25 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
18 Jul 25.1 °C 22 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
19 Jul 26.0 °C 19 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
20 Jul 27.2 °C 22 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
21 Jul 25.7 °C 36 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
22 Jul 27.9 °C 31 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
23 Jul 27.5 °C 22 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
24 Jul 27.6 °C 22 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
25 Jul 27.7 °C 17 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
26 Jul 28.2 °C 23 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
27 Jul after 28.2 °C 23 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
28 Jul after 28.8 °C 22 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
29 Jul after 30.5 °C 19 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
30 Jul after 23.9 °C 20 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
31 Jul after 22.5 °C 16 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
1 Aug after 23.8 °C 12 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
2 Aug after 27.5 °C 25 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
3 Aug after 26.1 °C 27 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
4 Aug after 25.3 °C 21 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
5 Aug after 25.5 °C 20 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 28 Jun 2023
After · 2 Aug 2023

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 · 615Every 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 5 July 2023 and 26 July 2023: 22 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 15,562 hectares (155.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Mavinga (15,710 ha, 0.4 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 28.2 °C, humidity dropped to 17 % and gusts hit 47 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 50, class Very high.
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.