Muconda fire, 27 July 2026 Muconda, Saurimo
The fire started on 27 July 2026 in Muconda, Angola, and satellites saw it burning for 43 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 47,992 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.
It is the 2th largest in Lunda Sul since 2016 (of 240 with a page). Number 21 in Angola in 2026, of 487.
Compare with…
- Burnt area
- 47,992ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 43days
- 27 Jul 2026 – 7 Sept 2026
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- municipalities
- Started on
- 27 Jul
- 2026
- Heat detections
- 1,294
- in a single hotspot: 412 MW
- Danger at start
- 38
- High · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 870MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.2 mm on 13 Sept.
This area had burned before
96% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 14,948 ha in 2016, 20,543 ha in 2017, 10,985 ha in 2018, 14,484 ha in 2019, 23,275 ha in 2020, 13,188 ha in 2021, 11,663 ha in 2022, 16,517 ha in 2023, 11,160 ha in 2024, 16,243 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 45,855 ha that had burned before.
- 10,684 ha Muconda fire, July 2020 11,513 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 7,956 ha Muconda fire, July 2020 9,636 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 6,862 ha Muconda fire, July 2017 7,922 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 5,489 ha Muconda fire, August 2025 6,070 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 4,752 ha Saurimo fire, July 2023 6,035 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 4,077 ha Saurimo fire, August 2025 5,165 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 4,001 ha Muconda fire, July 2019 5,630 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,980 ha Saurimo fire, July 2016 5,353 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
Berlin boundary: geoBoundaries · Federal Agency for Cartography and Geodesy (dl-de/by-2-0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
Muconda where it started36,612 ha reached on 27 Jul1.3 %
-
11,697 ha reached on 27 Jul0.5 %
Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.
People and buildings inside the perimeter
GHSL 2025Inside the perimeter there was no noticeable built-up land and almost nobody lived there (GHSL 2025, satellite-based estimate).
This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned. The GHSL 2025 epoch is a projection made from 2020 and earlier data.
Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 27 Jul | 29.1 °C | 29 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 38 |
| 28 Jul | 29.1 °C | 22 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 29 Jul | 29.8 °C | 22 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 38 |
| 30 Jul | 30.1 °C | 21 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 31 Jul | 29.6 °C | 25 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 1 Aug | 29.8 °C | 21 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 2 Aug | 30.3 °C | 17 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 3 Aug | 29.8 °C | 21 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 4 Aug | 30.6 °C | 20 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 5 Aug | 31.2 °C | 13 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 6 Aug | 31.0 °C | 16 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 7 Aug | 30.5 °C | 21 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 8 Aug | 30.5 °C | 23 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 9 Aug | 30.7 °C | 25 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 10 Aug | 32.1 °C | 15 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 11 Aug | 30.9 °C | 19 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 12 Aug | 30.8 °C | 25 % | 40 km/h | 0.1 mm | Very high 44 |
| 13 Aug | 30.4 °C | 31 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 14 Aug | 30.1 °C | 31 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 15 Aug | 30.7 °C | 28 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 16 Aug | 30.0 °C | 24 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 17 Aug | 30.3 °C | 20 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 18 Aug | 31.0 °C | 15 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 19 Aug | 31.3 °C | 17 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 20 Aug | 30.9 °C | 18 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 21 Aug | 31.3 °C | 21 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 22 Aug | 32.2 °C | 24 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 23 Aug | 33.1 °C | 22 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 24 Aug | 33.0 °C | 20 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 25 Aug | 32.2 °C | 29 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 26 Aug | 31.1 °C | 33 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 27 Aug | 34.1 °C | 24 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 28 Aug | 31.9 °C | 28 % | 42 km/h | 0.1 mm | Very high 42 |
| 29 Aug | 31.3 °C | 29 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 30 Aug | 32.1 °C | 27 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 31 Aug | 32.4 °C | 29 % | 20 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 35 |
| 1 Sept | 32.0 °C | 30 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 2 Sept | 33.9 °C | 24 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 3 Sept | 32.7 °C | 31 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 4 Sept | 32.8 °C | 31 % | 41 km/h | 0.7 mm | High 34 |
| 5 Sept | 27.9 °C | 46 % | 27 km/h | 11.6 mm | Very low 4 |
| 6 Sept | 32.0 °C | 35 % | 20 km/h | 1.3 mm | Moderate 12 |
| 7 Sept | 31.1 °C | 38 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 8 Sept after | 32.0 °C | 35 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 9 Sept after | 31.3 °C | 31 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 10 Sept after | 31.7 °C | 31 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 11 Sept after | 31.9 °C | 31 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 12 Sept after | 31.8 °C | 38 % | 24 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 27 |
| 13 Sept after | 29.3 °C | 48 % | 27 km/h | 1.2 mm | Moderate 15 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
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 · CopernicusOn 21 August 2026 the air beside the fire reached 174 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 100: 6.6 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
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 · 1,294Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 9,636 haMuconda10 July 2020 · 9 days · 8 km away
- 12,487 haSaurimo22 June 2016 · 27 days · 19 km away
- 11,554 haSaurimo12 August 2026 · 18 days · 19 km away
- 11,513 haMuconda15 July 2020 · 14 days · 21 km away
- 9,438 haMuconda11 July 2021 · 18 days · 22 km away
- 9,737 haMuconda5 August 2017 · 11 days · 28 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Muconda fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 27 July 2026 to 7 September 2026 (43 days). The perimeter dates it from 29 July 2026 to 31 August 2026.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 47,992 hectares (479.9 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Muconda (36,612 ha, 1.3 %); Saurimo (11,697 ha, 0.5 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 34.1 °C, humidity dropped to 13 % and gusts hit 42 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 46, class Very high.
- 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
History of this page · 1 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
- Last day with fire: 4 September 2026 → 7 September 2026.
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.
Report an error
How we know this
- Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery; 3 polygons grouped in this page.
- Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 29 July 2026 to 31 August 2026. 1,294 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
- We have not matched this page with any official record.
- Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
- Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2025, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.
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.