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Mpungu fire, August 2025 Mpungu, Okankolo

Out · last detection 6 Sept 2025, 11:46 UTC

The fire started on 26 August 2025 in Mpungu, Namibia, and satellites saw it burning for 11 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,621 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 34th largest in Kavango West since 2016 (of 152 with a page). Number 34 in Namibia in 2025, of 87.

Burnt area
4,621ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
11days
26 Aug 2025 – 5 Sept 2025
Municipalities hit
2
constituencies
Started on
26 Aug
2025
Heat detections
177
in a single hotspot: 52 MW
Danger at start
45
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
1.9GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

6 Sept 2025
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 26 Aug5 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

2628293031123456

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

The weather it burned in

34°high
55km/h · peak gust
9%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

69% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,902 ha in 2016, 1,560 ha in 2017. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,173 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Mpungu where it started
    4,557 ha reached on 26 Aug
    0.6 %
  2. Okankolo
    84 ha
    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)
26 Aug 28.6 °C 25 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
27 Aug 27.6 °C 25 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
28 Aug 31.6 °C 18 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
29 Aug 33.6 °C 17 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
30 Aug 34.5 °C 10 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
31 Aug 33.4 °C 10 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 59
1 Sept 33.5 °C 10 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
2 Sept 33.7 °C 9 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 62
3 Sept 32.1 °C 9 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 64
4 Sept 32.6 °C 9 % 55 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 71
5 Sept 32.7 °C 11 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
6 Sept after 33.1 °C 11 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
7 Sept after 33.2 °C 11 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
8 Sept after 32.9 °C 11 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
9 Sept after 32.9 °C 12 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
10 Sept after 34.6 °C 11 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
11 Sept after 34.4 °C 12 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
12 Sept after 35.4 °C 10 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 64
13 Sept after 35.4 °C 10 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
14 Sept after 35.9 °C 13 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
15 Sept after 35.6 °C 13 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 19 Aug 2025
After · 12 Sept 2025

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 28 August 2025 the air beside the fire reached 31 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 27: 1.8 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak31 µg/m³
Days over the guideline10 days
PM1031 µg/m³
Optical depth0.89
242526272829303112345678
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 · 177Every 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 Namibia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Mpungu fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 26 August 2025 and 5 September 2025: 11 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 4,621 hectares (46.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Mpungu (4,557 ha, 0.6 %); Okankolo (84 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 34.5 °C, humidity dropped to 9 % and gusts hit 55 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 71, class Very extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Namibia (OCHA COD-AB). 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 OCHA COD-AB (Namibia Statistics Agency (NSA)) (Creative Commons Attribution for Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY-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.