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Mopeia fire, August 2016 Mopeia, Chinde

Out · last detection 2 Oct 2016, 10:46 UTC

The fire started on 29 August 2016 in Mopeia, Mozambique, and satellites saw it burning for 35 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 11,558 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 142th largest in Zambézia since 2016 (of 845 with a page). Number 19 in Mozambique in 2016, of 194.

Burnt area
11,558ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
35days
29 Aug 2016 – 2 Oct 2016
Municipalities hit
2
districts
Started on
29 Aug
2016
Heat detections
1,392
in a single hotspot: 62 MW
Danger at start
24
High · FWI index
Energy released
11.6GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

2 Oct 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 29 Aug2 Oct

How it evolved, day by day

29303112345678910111213141516171819202122232425262728293012

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

The weather it burned in

38°high
50km/h · peak gust
21%lowest humidity

It had gone 16 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 3.4 mm on 3 Oct.

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

  1. Mopeia where it started
    10,987 ha reached on 23 Aug
    1.4 %
  2. Chinde
    641 ha reached on 26 Aug
    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)
22 Aug 32.5 °C 43 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
23 Aug 28.9 °C 54 % 48 km/h 1.8 mm Moderate 14
24 Aug 26.8 °C 48 % 46 km/h 0.2 mm High 22
25 Aug 26.3 °C 41 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 21
26 Aug 27.4 °C 42 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
27 Aug 26.8 °C 45 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
28 Aug 27.9 °C 46 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
29 Aug 30.0 °C 44 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
30 Aug 29.1 °C 47 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
31 Aug 29.6 °C 39 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
1 Sept 29.2 °C 39 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
2 Sept 28.8 °C 42 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
3 Sept 29.5 °C 42 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
4 Sept 31.2 °C 40 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
5 Sept 32.6 °C 32 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
6 Sept 33.3 °C 35 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
7 Sept 32.6 °C 30 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
8 Sept 35.1 °C 30 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
9 Sept 36.1 °C 21 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
10 Sept 36.1 °C 22 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
11 Sept 31.0 °C 41 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
12 Sept 31.0 °C 44 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
13 Sept 32.1 °C 35 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
14 Sept 30.1 °C 48 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
15 Sept 32.2 °C 41 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
16 Sept 34.7 °C 26 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
17 Sept 36.9 °C 26 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
18 Sept 35.2 °C 25 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
19 Sept 30.2 °C 53 % 40 km/h 0.2 mm High 29
20 Sept 30.9 °C 42 % 34 km/h 0.1 mm High 28
21 Sept 32.1 °C 38 % 32 km/h 0.1 mm High 31
22 Sept 35.2 °C 29 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
23 Sept 37.2 °C 23 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
24 Sept 36.1 °C 26 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
25 Sept 35.4 °C 29 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
26 Sept 31.2 °C 44 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
27 Sept 32.4 °C 41 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
28 Sept 37.3 °C 24 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
29 Sept 36.3 °C 29 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
30 Sept 33.7 °C 34 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
1 Oct 35.0 °C 31 % 41 km/h 0.2 mm Very high 44
2 Oct 37.7 °C 25 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
3 Oct after 26.5 °C 71 % 51 km/h 3.4 mm Low 9

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 22 Aug 2016
After · 9 Oct 2016

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 · 1,392Every 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 Mopeia fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 29 August 2016 and 2 October 2016: 35 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 11,558 hectares (115.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Mopeia (10,987 ha, 1.4 %); Chinde (641 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 37.7 °C, humidity dropped to 21 % and gusts hit 50 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 52, 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.