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Mecula fire, 23 October 2019 Mavago, Mecula

Out · last detection 1 Nov 2019, 10:54 UTC

The fire started on 23 October 2019 in Mecula, Mozambique, and satellites saw it burning for 10 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 16,619 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 20th largest in Niassa since 2016 (of 567 with a page). Number 8 in Mozambique in 2019, of 212.

Burnt area
16,619ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
10days
23 Oct 2019 – 1 Nov 2019
Municipalities hit
2
districts
Started on
23 Oct
2019
Heat detections
529
in a single hotspot: 232 MW
Danger at start
23
High · FWI index
Energy released
6.6GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

1 Nov 2019
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 23 Oct1 Nov

How it evolved, day by day

2324252627282930311

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
45km/h · peak gust
17%lowest humidity

It had gone 3 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 4.9 mm on 7 Nov.

This area had burned before

63% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 4,708 ha in 2016, 6,555 ha in 2017, 2,054 ha in 2018. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 10,390 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Mavago
    12,523 ha reached on 26 Oct
    1.4 %
  2. Mecula where it started
    4,199 ha reached on 23 Oct
    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)
23 Oct 33.5 °C 35 % 31 km/h 0.3 mm High 23
24 Oct 33.9 °C 34 % 38 km/h 0.2 mm High 23
25 Oct 33.5 °C 35 % 36 km/h 0.1 mm High 24
26 Oct 34.1 °C 29 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
27 Oct 35.0 °C 18 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
28 Oct 35.9 °C 21 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
29 Oct 35.2 °C 17 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
30 Oct 35.0 °C 18 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
31 Oct 35.3 °C 21 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
1 Nov 34.2 °C 29 % 45 km/h 0.4 mm High 36
2 Nov after 33.0 °C 32 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
3 Nov after 33.2 °C 39 % 32 km/h 0.4 mm High 29
4 Nov after 32.2 °C 39 % 34 km/h 0.5 mm High 27
5 Nov after 31.6 °C 41 % 30 km/h 0.5 mm High 26
6 Nov after 32.1 °C 38 % 36 km/h 0.1 mm High 28
7 Nov after 34.0 °C 33 % 37 km/h 4.9 mm Moderate 12

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 16 Oct 2019
After · 8 Nov 2019

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 · 529Every 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 23 October 2019 and 1 November 2019: 10 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 16,619 hectares (166.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Mavago (12,523 ha, 1.4 %); Mecula (4,199 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 35.9 °C, humidity dropped to 17 % and gusts hit 45 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 37, 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.