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Milange fire, 27 September 2022 Milange, Morrumbala

Out · last detection 24 Oct 2022, 23:44 UTC

The fire started on 27 September 2022 in Milange, Mozambique, and satellites saw it burning for 28 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 14,998 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 100th largest in Zambézia since 2016 (of 841 with a page). Number 19 in Mozambique in 2022, of 206.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Morrumbala · 2016Milange · 2019Morrumbala · 2018Morrumbala · 2017

Burnt area
14,998ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
28days
27 Sept 2022 – 24 Oct 2022
Municipalities hit
2
districts
Started on
27 Sept
2022
Heat detections
800
in a single hotspot: 80 MW
Danger at start
33
High · FWI index
Average daily power
291MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 27 Sept24 Oct
24 Oct 2022

How it evolved, day by day

27 Sept 2022 · 18 MW · 3 28 Sept 2022 · 12 MW · 1 29 Sept 2022 · 35 MW · 4 30 Sept 2022 · 68 MW · 7 1 Oct 2022 · 15 MW · 1 2 Oct 2022 · 184 MW · 16 3 Oct 2022 · 57 MW · 10 4 Oct 2022 · 111 MW · 19 5 Oct 2022 · 237 MW · 37 6 Oct 2022 · 899 MW · 85 7 Oct 2022 · 1,012 MW · 90 8 Oct 2022 · 284 MW · 29 9 Oct 2022 · 71 MW · 15 10 Oct 2022 · 945 MW · 102 11 Oct 2022 · 1,408 MW · 105 12 Oct 2022 · 712 MW · 78 13 Oct 2022 · 818 MW · 59 14 Oct 2022 · 201 MW · 23 15 Oct 2022 · 674 MW · 63 16 Oct 2022 · 91 MW · 11 17 Oct 2022 · 57 MW · 9 18 Oct 2022 · 52 MW · 7 19 Oct 2022 · 32 MW · 4 20 Oct 2022 · 10 MW · 2 21 Oct 2022 · 1 MW · 1 22 Oct 2022 · 42 MW · 7 23 Oct 2022 · 13 MW · 1 24 Oct 2022 · 92 MW · 11
27 Sept 1 Oct 5 Oct 9 Oct 11 Oct 13 Oct 17 Oct 21 Oct

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
43km/h · peak gust
19%lowest humidity

It had gone 11 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 4.8 mm on 29 Oct.

This area had burned before

100% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 13,894 ha in 2016, 7,099 ha in 2017, 10,873 ha in 2018, 10,736 ha in 2019, 9,292 ha in 2020, 1,404 ha in 2021. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 14,965 ha that had burned before.

How big is it?

10 km
It burned the equivalent of 9.5% of the area of London (150 km² against 1,583 km²).

London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).

This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.

What happened to each town

  1. Milange where it started
    14,304 ha reached on 27 Sept
    2.6 %
  2. Morrumbala
    798 ha reached on 3 Oct
    0.1 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area 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)
27 Sept 34.0 °C 24 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
28 Sept 30.6 °C 35 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
29 Sept 30.8 °C 38 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
30 Sept 32.1 °C 26 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
1 Oct 33.0 °C 24 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
2 Oct 33.3 °C 27 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
3 Oct 33.7 °C 31 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
4 Oct 35.8 °C 24 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
5 Oct 35.4 °C 19 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
6 Oct 35.2 °C 23 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
7 Oct 35.5 °C 23 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
8 Oct 33.0 °C 33 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
9 Oct 33.5 °C 26 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
10 Oct 34.0 °C 27 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
11 Oct 32.7 °C 25 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
12 Oct 33.0 °C 26 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
13 Oct 34.3 °C 27 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
14 Oct 35.1 °C 20 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
15 Oct 35.0 °C 20 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
16 Oct 34.1 °C 21 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
17 Oct 33.5 °C 25 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
18 Oct 32.6 °C 32 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
19 Oct 31.3 °C 42 % 34 km/h 0.2 mm High 31
20 Oct 32.6 °C 34 % 34 km/h 0.4 mm High 31
21 Oct 34.0 °C 27 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
22 Oct 35.5 °C 22 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
23 Oct 35.4 °C 26 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
24 Oct 36.4 °C 24 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
25 Oct after 35.0 °C 30 % 24 km/h 0.2 mm High 36
26 Oct after 37.1 °C 23 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
27 Oct after 37.5 °C 19 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
28 Oct after 37.1 °C 22 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
29 Oct after 31.1 °C 49 % 39 km/h 4.8 mm Low 7

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 20 Sept 2022
After · 31 Oct 2022

If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.

The smoke

CAMS · Copernicus

On 27 October 2022 the air beside the fire reached 88 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 44: 3.0 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak88 µg/m³
Days over the guideline27 days
PM10127 µg/m³
Optical depth2.49
252627282930123456789101112131415161718192021222324252627
Good Fair Moderate Poor Very poor Extremely poor

Particles from the Copernicus CAMS model at the centre of the perimeter; these are not measurements in each town. The pale bar is the worst hour, the solid one the daily average.

Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS)

Detections table · 800Every 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 Milange fire last?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 27 September 2022 to 24 October 2022 (28 days). The perimeter dates it from 4 October 2022 to 17 October 2022.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 14,998 hectares (150.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Milange (14,304 ha, 2.6 %); Morrumbala (798 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 36.4 °C, humidity dropped to 19 % and gusts hit 43 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 46, 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

History of this page · 2 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
  1. Last day with fire: 17 October 2022 → 24 October 2022.
  2. Start date: 4 October 2022 → 27 September 2022.

RSS Changes to this page

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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How we know this
  • Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery.
  • Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 4 October 2022 to 17 October 2022. 800 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
  • We have not matched this page with any official record.
  • Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.

How we build fire pages: methodology ›

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.