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Murrupula fire, 13 September 2025 Murrupula, Rapale, Ribaué

Out · last detection 30 Sept 2025, 10:56 UTC

The fire started on 13 September 2025 in Murrupula, Mozambique, and satellites saw it burning for 17 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 15,282 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.

It is the 23th largest in Nampula since 2016 (of 392 with a page). Number 25 in Mozambique in 2025, of 313.

Burnt area
15,282ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
17days
13 Sept 2025 – 29 Sept 2025
Municipalities hit
3
districts
Started on
13 Sept
2025
Heat detections
556
in a single hotspot: 91 MW
Danger at start
32
High · FWI index
Energy released
5.1GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

30 Sept 2025
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 13 Sept29 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

13141516171819202122232425262930

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

The weather it burned in

33°high
51km/h · peak gust
25%lowest humidity

It had gone 36 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

97% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 7,771 ha in 2016, 6,991 ha in 2017, 6,245 ha in 2018, 4,694 ha in 2019, 5,590 ha in 2020, 3,632 ha in 2021, 5,474 ha in 2022, 1,026 ha in 2023, 1,978 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 14,813 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Murrupula where it started
    13,814 ha reached on 9 Sept
    4.4 %
  2. Rapale
    1,182 ha reached on 9 Sept
    0.3 %
  3. Ribaué
    356 ha reached on 9 Sept
    0.1 %

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)
9 Sept 31.3 °C 32 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
10 Sept 30.9 °C 31 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
11 Sept 29.8 °C 32 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
12 Sept 29.9 °C 31 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
13 Sept 30.1 °C 29 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
14 Sept 31.0 °C 29 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
15 Sept 29.3 °C 36 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
16 Sept 30.3 °C 34 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
17 Sept 32.6 °C 25 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
18 Sept 32.5 °C 30 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
19 Sept 31.3 °C 37 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
20 Sept 29.1 °C 37 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
21 Sept 30.3 °C 34 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
22 Sept 32.3 °C 28 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
23 Sept 31.9 °C 30 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
24 Sept 31.6 °C 29 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
25 Sept 31.3 °C 30 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
26 Sept 29.8 °C 34 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
27 Sept 26.5 °C 50 % 43 km/h 0.4 mm High 30
28 Sept 30.1 °C 37 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
29 Sept 31.9 °C 34 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
30 Sept after 31.0 °C 36 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
1 Oct after 27.1 °C 48 % 48 km/h 1.4 mm Moderate 20
2 Oct after 26.3 °C 42 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
3 Oct after 26.6 °C 39 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
4 Oct after 25.7 °C 43 % 51 km/h 0.5 mm High 32
5 Oct after 26.5 °C 50 % 41 km/h 1.6 mm Moderate 15
6 Oct after 29.7 °C 36 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
7 Oct after 30.0 °C 41 % 28 km/h 0.1 mm High 25
8 Oct after 30.2 °C 33 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
9 Oct after 30.8 °C 36 % 36 km/h 0.5 mm High 30
10 Oct after 32.0 °C 28 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
11 Oct after 31.8 °C 33 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
12 Oct after 32.5 °C 32 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
13 Oct after 32.3 °C 26 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
14 Oct after 31.9 °C 29 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
15 Oct after 32.6 °C 24 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
16 Oct after 32.5 °C 26 % 35 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 · 6 Sept 2025
After · 6 Oct 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 12 September 2025 the air beside the fire reached 44 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 21: 1.4 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak44 µg/m³
Days over the guideline5 days
PM1046 µg/m³
Optical depth0.76
111213141516171819202122232425262728293012
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 · 556Every 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 Murrupula fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 13 September 2025 and 29 September 2025: 17 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 15,282 hectares (152.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 3 municipalities: Murrupula (13,814 ha, 4.4 %); Rapale (1,182 ha, 0.3 %); Ribaué (356 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 32.6 °C, humidity dropped to 25 % and gusts hit 51 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 39, class Very 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

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 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.