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Mpika fire, 14 September 2018 Mpika

Out · last detection 28 Sept 2018, 12:16 UTC

The fire started on 14 September 2018 in Mpika, Zambia, and satellites saw it burning for 14 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 8,955 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 105th largest in Muchinga since 2016 (of 513 with a page). Number 35 in Zambia in 2018, of 204.

Burnt area
8,955ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
14days
14 Sept 2018 – 27 Sept 2018
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
14 Sept
2018
Heat detections
708
in a single hotspot: 78 MW
Danger at start
34
High · FWI index
Energy released
8.1GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

28 Sept 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 14 Sept27 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

141516171819202122232425262728

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

The weather it burned in

32°high
44km/h · peak gust
20%lowest humidity

It had gone 56 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

20% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,559 ha in 2016, 417 ha in 2017. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 1,803 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Mpika where it started
    9,002 ha reached on 14 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)
14 Sept 30.8 °C 24 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
15 Sept 30.9 °C 23 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
16 Sept 30.7 °C 23 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
17 Sept 31.1 °C 22 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
18 Sept 30.6 °C 22 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
19 Sept 29.8 °C 23 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
20 Sept 30.3 °C 28 % 41 km/h 0.1 mm Very high 40
21 Sept 29.5 °C 31 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
22 Sept 30.8 °C 24 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
23 Sept 30.0 °C 24 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
24 Sept 29.7 °C 26 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
25 Sept 30.3 °C 23 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
26 Sept 32.4 °C 20 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
27 Sept 31.9 °C 23 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
28 Sept after 31.9 °C 22 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
29 Sept after 31.7 °C 22 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
30 Sept after 27.9 °C 31 % 59 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
1 Oct after 24.9 °C 41 % 47 km/h 0.6 mm High 34
2 Oct after 28.9 °C 32 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
3 Oct after 30.7 °C 29 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
4 Oct after 32.1 °C 24 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
5 Oct after 29.9 °C 32 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
6 Oct after 30.0 °C 27 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
7 Oct after 30.1 °C 22 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 7 Sept 2018
After · 4 Oct 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 · 708Every 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 Zambia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Mpika fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 14 September 2018 and 27 September 2018: 14 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 8,955 hectares (89.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Mpika (9,002 ha, 0.5 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 32.4 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 44 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 44, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Zambia (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 4.0 (CC BY 4.0)). 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.