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Muconda fire, 6 August 2016 Muconda

Out · last detection 14 Aug 2016, 00:13 UTC

The fire started on 6 August 2016 in Muconda, Angola, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 12,776 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 26th largest in Lunda Sul since 2016 (of 240 with a page). Number 15 in Angola in 2016, of 138.

Burnt area
12,776ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
8days
6 Aug 2016 – 13 Aug 2016
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
6 Aug
2016
Heat detections
347
in a single hotspot: 244 MW
Danger at start
54
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
8.6GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

14 Aug 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 6 Aug13 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

67891011121314

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
47km/h · peak gust
11%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.6 mm on 22 Aug.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Muconda where it started
    12,822 ha reached on 6 Aug
    0.4 %

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)
6 Aug 30.9 °C 11 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
7 Aug 32.1 °C 13 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
8 Aug 31.4 °C 16 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
9 Aug 32.4 °C 19 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
10 Aug 33.0 °C 20 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
11 Aug 32.3 °C 18 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
12 Aug 34.1 °C 16 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
13 Aug 34.4 °C 16 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
14 Aug after 33.7 °C 20 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
15 Aug after 32.9 °C 25 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
16 Aug after 31.2 °C 35 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
17 Aug after 34.5 °C 16 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
18 Aug after 33.7 °C 17 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
19 Aug after 34.5 °C 17 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
20 Aug after 33.8 °C 20 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
21 Aug after 33.8 °C 25 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
22 Aug after 31.9 °C 37 % 27 km/h 1.6 mm Moderate 18

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 30 Jul 2016
After · 20 Aug 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 · 347Every 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 Angola ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Muconda fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 6 August 2016 and 13 August 2016: 8 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 12,776 hectares (127.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Muconda (12,822 ha, 0.4 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 34.5 °C, humidity dropped to 11 % and gusts hit 47 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 54, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Angola (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 (Public Domain). 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.