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Mpika fire, 16 August 2026 Mpika, Lavushimanda

Out · last detection 25 Aug 2026, 11:38 UTC

The fire started on 16 August 2026 in Mpika, Zambia, and satellites saw it burning for 11 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,445 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 283th largest in Muchinga since 2016 (of 513 with a page). Number 280 in Zambia in 2026, of 604.

Burnt area
4,445ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
11days
16 Aug 2026 – 26 Aug 2026
Municipalities hit
2
districts
Started on
16 Aug
2026
Heat detections
73
in a single hotspot: 148 MW
Danger at start
28
High · FWI index
Energy released
769MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

25 Aug 2026
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 16 Aug26 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

161718192021232425

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
55km/h · peak gust
25%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

66% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 741 ha in 2016, 57 ha in 2017, 757 ha in 2018, 1,289 ha in 2020, 1,045 ha in 2021, 1,091 ha in 2022, 634 ha in 2023, 921 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,917 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Mpika where it started
    4,077 ha reached on 16 Aug
    0.2 %
  2. Lavushimanda
    397 ha reached on 16 Aug
    0.0 %

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)
16 Aug 22.9 °C 32 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
17 Aug 23.7 °C 28 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
18 Aug 24.6 °C 25 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
19 Aug 23.9 °C 29 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
20 Aug 23.9 °C 33 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
21 Aug 24.8 °C 32 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
22 Aug 25.2 °C 37 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
23 Aug 26.1 °C 36 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
24 Aug 26.5 °C 35 % 55 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
25 Aug 26.8 °C 37 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
26 Aug 26.8 °C 39 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
27 Aug after 25.5 °C 42 % 59 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
28 Aug after 24.4 °C 41 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
29 Aug after 25.9 °C 38 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
30 Aug after 27.2 °C 30 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
31 Aug after 27.5 °C 32 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
1 Sept after 27.6 °C 32 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
2 Sept after 27.1 °C 34 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
3 Sept after 28.4 °C 31 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
4 Sept after 29.6 °C 29 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
5 Sept after 28.3 °C 34 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 37

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 9 Aug 2026
After · 2 Sept 2026

If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.

The smoke

CAMS · Copernicus

On 25 August 2026 the air beside the fire reached 44 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 36: 2.4 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak44 µg/m³
Days over the guideline10 days
PM1047 µg/m³
Optical depth0.78
14151617181920212223242526272829
Good Fair Moderate Poor Very poor Extremely poor

Particles from the Copernicus CAMS model at the centre of the perimeter; these are not measurements in each town. The pale bar is the worst hour, the solid one the daily average.

Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS)

Detections table · 73Every 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?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 16 August 2026 to 26 August 2026 (11 days). The perimeter dates it from 19 August 2026 to 26 August 2026.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 4,445 hectares (44.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Mpika (4,077 ha, 0.2 %); Lavushimanda (397 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 26.8 °C, humidity dropped to 25 % and gusts hit 55 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 41, 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.