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Mecula fire, 18 September 2018 Mecula

Out · last detection 23 Sept 2018, 23:16 UTC

The fire started on 18 September 2018 in Mecula, Mozambique, and satellites saw it burning for 6 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,313 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 465th largest in Niassa since 2016 (of 577 with a page). Number 169 in Mozambique in 2018, of 220.

Burnt area
3,313ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
6days
18 Sept 2018 – 23 Sept 2018
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
18 Sept
2018
Heat detections
112
in a single hotspot: 176 MW
Danger at start
31
High · FWI index
Energy released
2.4GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

23 Sept 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 18 Sept23 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

1820212223

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

The weather it burned in

32°high
50km/h · peak gust
27%lowest humidity

It had gone 6 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.4 mm on 2 Oct.

This area had burned before

34% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 582 ha in 2016, 544 ha in 2017.

What happened to each town

  1. Mecula where it started
    3,335 ha reached on 18 Sept
    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)
18 Sept 32.3 °C 27 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
19 Sept 29.8 °C 43 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
20 Sept 31.7 °C 36 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
21 Sept 32.2 °C 30 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
22 Sept 31.1 °C 30 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
23 Sept 30.9 °C 29 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
24 Sept after 31.0 °C 34 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
25 Sept after 31.6 °C 36 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
26 Sept after 33.4 °C 35 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
27 Sept after 31.1 °C 38 % 36 km/h 0.1 mm High 33
28 Sept after 31.8 °C 33 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
29 Sept after 32.0 °C 30 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
30 Sept after 31.9 °C 30 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
1 Oct after 29.8 °C 43 % 41 km/h 0.7 mm High 25
2 Oct after 30.4 °C 39 % 35 km/h 1.4 mm Moderate 19

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 11 Sept 2018
After · 30 Sept 2018

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 · 112Every 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 18 September 2018 and 23 September 2018: 6 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 3,313 hectares (33.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Mecula (3,335 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 32.3 °C, humidity dropped to 27 % and gusts hit 50 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 32, class 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.