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MZ · Mozambique · →

Mecula fire, 1 October 2017 Mecula

Out · last detection 5 Oct 2017, 10:48 UTC

The fire started on 1 October 2017 in Mecula, Mozambique, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 6,071 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 150th largest in Niassa since 2016 (of 567 with a page). Number 52 in Mozambique in 2017, of 196.

Burnt area
6,071ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
5days
1 Oct 2017 – 5 Oct 2017
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
1 Oct
2017
Heat detections
162
in a single hotspot: 46 MW
Danger at start
34
High · FWI index
Energy released
930MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

5 Oct 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 1 Oct5 Oct

How it evolved, day by day

12345

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
40km/h · peak gust
23%lowest humidity

It had gone 5 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

39% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,394 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Mecula where it started
    6,108 ha reached on 1 Oct
    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)
1 Oct 32.5 °C 32 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
2 Oct 32.1 °C 32 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
3 Oct 33.6 °C 23 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
4 Oct 32.5 °C 34 % 35 km/h 0.4 mm Very high 38
5 Oct 32.7 °C 35 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
6 Oct after 32.9 °C 34 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
7 Oct after 32.9 °C 34 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
8 Oct after 30.5 °C 41 % 36 km/h 0.2 mm High 33
9 Oct after 31.4 °C 38 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
10 Oct after 34.3 °C 31 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
11 Oct after 35.7 °C 27 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
12 Oct after 35.7 °C 32 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
13 Oct after 32.8 °C 40 % 35 km/h 0.2 mm High 35
14 Oct after 31.8 °C 29 % 36 km/h 0.3 mm High 35
15 Oct after 33.4 °C 28 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 35

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 24 Sept 2017
After · 12 Oct 2017

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 · 162Every 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 Mozambique ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Mecula fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 1 October 2017 and 5 October 2017: 5 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 6,071 hectares (60.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Mecula (6,108 ha, 0.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 33.6 °C, humidity dropped to 23 % and gusts hit 40 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 40, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Mozambique (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 (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.