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Mlele fire, 11 August 2018 Mlele

Out · last detection 16 Aug 2018, 23:28 UTC

The fire started on 11 August 2018 in Mlele, Tanzania, and satellites saw it burning for 6 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,350 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 218th largest in Katavi since 2016 (of 271 with a page). Number 54 in Tanzania in 2018, of 72.

Burnt area
3,350ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
6days
11 Aug 2018 – 16 Aug 2018
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
11 Aug
2018
Heat detections
121
in a single hotspot: 36 MW
Danger at start
33
High · FWI index
Energy released
734MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

16 Aug 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 11 Aug16 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

111213141516

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

The weather it burned in

27°high
35km/h · peak gust
29%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

52% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,550 ha in 2016, 327 ha in 2017. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 1,751 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Mlele where it started
    3,376 ha reached on 11 Aug
    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)
11 Aug 27.1 °C 29 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
12 Aug 26.6 °C 32 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
13 Aug 26.1 °C 36 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
14 Aug 26.3 °C 32 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
15 Aug 26.5 °C 36 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
16 Aug 26.4 °C 32 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
17 Aug after 26.9 °C 35 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
18 Aug after 28.3 °C 29 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
19 Aug after 27.0 °C 33 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
20 Aug after 27.0 °C 33 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
21 Aug after 26.9 °C 33 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
22 Aug after 28.4 °C 35 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
23 Aug after 29.1 °C 38 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
24 Aug after 27.0 °C 39 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
25 Aug after 27.5 °C 32 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
26 Aug after 27.7 °C 35 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 28

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 4 Aug 2018
After · 23 Aug 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 · 121Every 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 11 August 2018 and 16 August 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 3,350 hectares (33.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Mlele (3,376 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 27.1 °C, humidity dropped to 29 % and gusts hit 35 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.