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Muembe fire, October 2022 Muembe

Out · last detection 2 Nov 2022, 22:33 UTC

The fire started on 7 October 2022 in Muembe, Mozambique, and satellites saw it burning for 26 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 11,239 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 48th largest in Niassa since 2016 (of 577 with a page). Number 28 in Mozambique in 2022, of 206.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Muembe · 2017Muembe · 2026Muembe · 2025Chimbonila · 2026

Burnt area
11,239ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
26days
7 Oct 2022 – 1 Nov 2022
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
7 Oct
2022
Heat detections
1,161
in a single hotspot: 163 MW
Danger at start
26
High · FWI index
Average daily power
493MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 7 Oct1 Nov
2 Nov 2022

How it evolved, day by day

7 Oct 2022 · 48 MW · 10 8 Oct 2022 · 36 MW · 8 9 Oct 2022 · 19 MW · 4 10 Oct 2022 · 404 MW · 41 11 Oct 2022 · 1,237 MW · 65 12 Oct 2022 · 1,269 MW · 86 13 Oct 2022 · 527 MW · 41 14 Oct 2022 · 663 MW · 56 15 Oct 2022 · 249 MW · 31 16 Oct 2022 · 377 MW · 44 17 Oct 2022 · 512 MW · 35 18 Oct 2022 · 54 MW · 7 19 Oct 2022 · 102 MW · 13 20 Oct 2022 · 489 MW · 32 21 Oct 2022 · 465 MW · 33 22 Oct 2022 · 351 MW · 52 23 Oct 2022 · 644 MW · 38 24 Oct 2022 · 1,068 MW · 56 25 Oct 2022 · 535 MW · 53 26 Oct 2022 · 878 MW · 80 27 Oct 2022 · 1,408 MW · 95 28 Oct 2022 · 1,136 MW · 76 29 Oct 2022 · 214 MW · 21 30 Oct 2022 · 190 MW · 10 31 Oct 2022 · 189 MW · 18 1 Nov 2022 · 120 MW · 17 2 Nov 2022 · 121 MW · 11
7 Oct 11 Oct 15 Oct 19 Oct 23 Oct 27 Oct 31 Oct

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

The weather it burned in

31°high
47km/h · peak gust
24%lowest humidity

It had gone 35 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 4.7 mm on 11 Nov.

This area had burned before

46% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,205 ha in 2016, 1,012 ha in 2017, 410 ha in 2018, 1,442 ha in 2019, 3,220 ha in 2020, 2,680 ha in 2021. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 5,162 ha that had burned before.

How big is it?

10 km
It burned the equivalent of 7.1% of the area of London (112 km² against 1,583 km²).

London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).

This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.

What happened to each town

  1. Muembe where it started
    11,322 ha reached on 1 Oct
    1.9 %

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 2020
Built-up area< 0.1 ha
Residents< 20

Inside the perimeter there was no noticeable built-up land and almost nobody lived there (GHSL 2020, 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.

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)
1 Oct 26.1 °C 33 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
2 Oct 27.5 °C 35 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
3 Oct 27.8 °C 36 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
4 Oct 28.3 °C 25 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
5 Oct 28.4 °C 30 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
6 Oct 28.6 °C 24 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
7 Oct 27.6 °C 32 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
8 Oct 28.1 °C 28 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
9 Oct 26.8 °C 32 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
10 Oct 27.8 °C 34 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
11 Oct 27.1 °C 32 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
12 Oct 26.9 °C 26 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
13 Oct 27.9 °C 31 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
14 Oct 28.0 °C 24 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
15 Oct 28.8 °C 29 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
16 Oct 27.1 °C 32 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
17 Oct 26.7 °C 36 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
18 Oct 27.0 °C 37 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
19 Oct 27.1 °C 38 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
20 Oct 27.5 °C 34 % 41 km/h 0.1 mm High 32
21 Oct 27.4 °C 36 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
22 Oct 28.4 °C 28 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
23 Oct 28.9 °C 33 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
24 Oct 30.5 °C 32 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
25 Oct 28.8 °C 37 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
26 Oct 30.7 °C 30 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
27 Oct 30.1 °C 24 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
28 Oct 30.8 °C 28 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
29 Oct 30.3 °C 33 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
30 Oct 28.1 °C 44 % 41 km/h 0.3 mm High 31
31 Oct 31.3 °C 33 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
1 Nov 30.0 °C 36 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
2 Nov after 28.4 °C 42 % 42 km/h 0.6 mm High 27
3 Nov after 28.3 °C 41 % 41 km/h 0.6 mm High 26
4 Nov after 28.7 °C 39 % 38 km/h 0.4 mm High 28
5 Nov after 29.0 °C 35 % 41 km/h 0.1 mm High 30
6 Nov after 29.6 °C 33 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
7 Nov after 30.6 °C 35 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
8 Nov after 30.0 °C 39 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
9 Nov after 30.1 °C 36 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
10 Nov after 28.3 °C 42 % 37 km/h 0.1 mm High 31
11 Nov after 27.2 °C 51 % 32 km/h 4.7 mm Low 6

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 30 Sept 2022
After · 8 Nov 2022

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 · 1,161Every 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 Mozambique ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Muembe fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 7 October 2022 and 1 November 2022: 26 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 11,239 hectares (112.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Muembe (11,322 ha, 1.9 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 31.3 °C, humidity dropped to 24 % and gusts hit 47 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 37, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Mozambique (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 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.

No changes since 24 October 2026.

RSS Changes to this page

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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How we know this
  • Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery.
  • Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 1,161 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 2020, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.

How we build fire pages: methodology ›

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 3.0 Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY 3.0 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.