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Mwandi fire, October 2018 Sesheke, Mwandi

Out · last detection 14 Oct 2018, 23:25 UTC

The fire started on 8 October 2018 in Mwandi, Zambia, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,114 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 139th largest in Western since 2016 (of 162 with a page). Number 193 in Zambia in 2018, of 204.

Burnt area
3,114ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
8days
8 Oct 2018 – 15 Oct 2018
Municipalities hit
2
districts
Started on
8 Oct
2018
Heat detections
106
in a single hotspot: 35 MW
Danger at start
55
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
1.0GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

14 Oct 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 8 Oct15 Oct

How it evolved, day by day

891011121314

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

The weather it burned in

36°high
44km/h · peak gust
11%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

4% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 3 ha in 2016, 124 ha in 2017.

What happened to each town

  1. Sesheke
    2,846 ha reached on 9 Oct
    0.2 %
  2. Mwandi where it started
    291 ha reached on 8 Oct
    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)
8 Oct 33.0 °C 13 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
9 Oct 32.7 °C 13 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
10 Oct 33.1 °C 12 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
11 Oct 34.2 °C 11 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
12 Oct 35.8 °C 11 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
13 Oct 36.2 °C 12 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
14 Oct 35.9 °C 19 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
15 Oct 35.4 °C 21 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
16 Oct after 35.0 °C 23 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
17 Oct after 36.5 °C 19 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
18 Oct after 36.8 °C 19 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
19 Oct after 37.3 °C 15 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
20 Oct after 35.7 °C 25 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
21 Oct after 34.2 °C 26 % 62 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
22 Oct after 29.1 °C 26 % 57 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
23 Oct after 28.5 °C 20 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
24 Oct after 27.1 °C 25 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
25 Oct after 31.1 °C 18 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 1 Oct 2018
After · 22 Oct 2018

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 · 106Every 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 Zambia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Mwandi fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 8 October 2018 and 15 October 2018: 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 3,114 hectares (31.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Sesheke (2,846 ha, 0.2 %); Mwandi (291 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 36.2 °C, humidity dropped to 11 % and gusts hit 44 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 55, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Zambia (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 4.0 (CC BY 4.0)). 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.