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Mlele fire, 1 July 2018 Mlele

Out · last detection 10 Jul 2018, 23:21 UTC

The fire started on 1 July 2018 in Mlele, Tanzania, and satellites saw it burning for 10 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,044 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 263th largest in Katavi since 2016 (of 271 with a page). Number 67 in Tanzania in 2018, of 72.

The power measured by the satellite is low (29.8 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.

Burnt area
3,044ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
10days
1 Jul 2018 – 10 Jul 2018
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
1 Jul
2018
Heat detections
85
in a single hotspot: 30 MW
Danger at start
28
High · FWI index
Energy released
563MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

10 Jul 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 1 Jul10 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

12345678910

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

The weather it burned in

29°high
48km/h · peak gust
38%lowest humidity

It had gone 44 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

96% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 3,039 ha in 2016, 1,302 ha in 2017. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,914 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Mlele where it started
    3,068 ha reached on 27 Jun
    0.1 %

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 Jul 27.4 °C 40 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
2 Jul 28.0 °C 42 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
3 Jul 28.7 °C 40 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
4 Jul 26.7 °C 38 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
5 Jul 25.4 °C 40 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
6 Jul 25.0 °C 41 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
7 Jul 27.1 °C 38 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
8 Jul 26.5 °C 42 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
9 Jul 26.6 °C 42 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
10 Jul 27.4 °C 44 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
11 Jul after 26.5 °C 45 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
12 Jul after 26.5 °C 44 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
13 Jul after 27.0 °C 42 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
14 Jul after 27.9 °C 36 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
15 Jul after 27.1 °C 38 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
16 Jul after 27.2 °C 38 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
17 Jul after 24.8 °C 43 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
18 Jul after 24.7 °C 44 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
19 Jul after 24.3 °C 43 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
20 Jul after 26.1 °C 38 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 30

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 24 Jun 2018
After · 17 Jul 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 · 85Every 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 Tanzania ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Mlele fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 1 July 2018 and 10 July 2018: 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 3,044 hectares (30.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Mlele (3,068 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 28.7 °C, humidity dropped to 38 % and gusts hit 48 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 34, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Tanzania (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.

Emergency number: 112

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.

Report an error
What do you think is wrong?

We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy. This is not an emergency service: if there is a fire now, call 112.

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.