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Mecula fire, 16 October 2017 Mecula

Out · last detection 23 Oct 2017, 22:58 UTC

The fire started on 16 October 2017 in Mecula, Mozambique, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 6,788 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 116th largest in Niassa since 2016 (of 567 with a page). Number 43 in Mozambique in 2017, of 196.

Burnt area
6,788ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
7days
16 Oct 2017 – 22 Oct 2017
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
16 Oct
2017
Heat detections
174
in a single hotspot: 146 MW
Danger at start
35
High · FWI index
Energy released
2.0GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

23 Oct 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 16 Oct22 Oct

How it evolved, day by day

1617181920212223

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

The weather it burned in

36°high
36km/h · peak gust
23%lowest humidity

It had gone 2 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.5 mm on 29 Oct.

This area had burned before

22% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,477 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Mecula where it started
    6,841 ha reached on 16 Oct
    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)
16 Oct 34.5 °C 23 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
17 Oct 35.1 °C 24 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
18 Oct 35.4 °C 24 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
19 Oct 33.9 °C 35 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
20 Oct 35.6 °C 27 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
21 Oct 34.4 °C 28 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
22 Oct 34.7 °C 31 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
23 Oct after 35.3 °C 24 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
24 Oct after 34.8 °C 28 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
25 Oct after 33.2 °C 34 % 31 km/h 0.3 mm High 38
26 Oct after 34.6 °C 33 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
27 Oct after 34.7 °C 34 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
28 Oct after 35.2 °C 29 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
29 Oct after 29.7 °C 47 % 41 km/h 1.5 mm Moderate 20

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 9 Oct 2017
After · 29 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 · 174Every 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 16 October 2017 and 22 October 2017: 7 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 6,788 hectares (67.9 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Mecula (6,841 ha, 0.4 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 35.6 °C, humidity dropped to 23 % and gusts hit 36 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 41, 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.