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Moatize fire, 1 October 2022 Moatize

Out · last detection 12 Oct 2022, 22:28 UTC

The fire started on 1 October 2022 in Moatize, Mozambique, and satellites saw it burning for 12 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,462 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 50th largest in Tete since 2016 (of 115 with a page). Number 99 in Mozambique in 2022, of 206.

Burnt area
4,462ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
12days
1 Oct 2022 – 12 Oct 2022
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
1 Oct
2022
Heat detections
267
in a single hotspot: 76 MW
Danger at start
39
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
2.1GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

12 Oct 2022
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 1 Oct12 Oct

How it evolved, day by day

123456789101112

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
46km/h · peak gust
16%lowest humidity

It had gone 30 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

91% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,754 ha in 2016, 1,850 ha in 2017, 1,058 ha in 2018, 645 ha in 2019, 2,378 ha in 2020, 2,449 ha in 2021. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 4,046 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Moatize where it started
    4,479 ha reached on 29 Sept
    0.5 %

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 Oct 33.3 °C 24 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
2 Oct 33.1 °C 24 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
3 Oct 34.4 °C 27 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
4 Oct 36.4 °C 18 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
5 Oct 35.8 °C 16 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
6 Oct 35.5 °C 17 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
7 Oct 35.5 °C 19 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
8 Oct 32.6 °C 30 % 46 km/h 0.1 mm Very high 45
9 Oct 32.0 °C 28 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
10 Oct 34.6 °C 23 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
11 Oct 32.6 °C 26 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
12 Oct 33.3 °C 22 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
13 Oct after 34.4 °C 24 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
14 Oct after 35.5 °C 17 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
15 Oct after 35.6 °C 18 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
16 Oct after 33.2 °C 23 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
17 Oct after 34.3 °C 24 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
18 Oct after 33.3 °C 29 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
19 Oct after 31.6 °C 38 % 34 km/h 0.1 mm High 35
20 Oct after 32.5 °C 35 % 38 km/h 0.2 mm High 36
21 Oct after 34.1 °C 24 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
22 Oct after 35.3 °C 24 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 24 Sept 2022
After · 19 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.

Detections table · 267Every 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 Moatize fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 1 October 2022 and 12 October 2022: 12 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 4,462 hectares (44.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Moatize (4,479 ha, 0.5 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 36.4 °C, humidity dropped to 16 % and gusts hit 46 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 50, class Extreme.
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.