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Mwense fire, August 2016 Mansa, Mwense

Out · last detection 6 Sept 2016, 23:23 UTC

The fire started on 25 August 2016 in Mwense, Zambia, and satellites saw it burning for 12 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 10,696 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 125th largest in Luapula since 2016 (of 533 with a page). Number 37 in Zambia in 2016, of 246.

Burnt area
10,696ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
12days
25 Aug 2016 – 5 Sept 2016
Municipalities hit
2
districts
Started on
25 Aug
2016
Heat detections
440
in a single hotspot: 57 MW
Danger at start
44
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
2.9GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

6 Sept 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 25 Aug5 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

25262728293031123456

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
51km/h · peak gust
21%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Mansa
    6,000 ha reached on 26 Aug
    0.8 %
  2. Mwense where it started
    4,763 ha reached on 25 Aug
    2.0 %

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)
25 Aug 27.4 °C 29 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
26 Aug 28.4 °C 27 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
27 Aug 28.2 °C 25 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
28 Aug 28.0 °C 24 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
29 Aug 28.1 °C 23 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
30 Aug 28.2 °C 22 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
31 Aug 28.9 °C 22 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
1 Sept 28.2 °C 24 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
2 Sept 27.9 °C 23 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
3 Sept 28.8 °C 22 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
4 Sept 30.4 °C 22 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
5 Sept 31.0 °C 21 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
6 Sept after 31.1 °C 19 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
7 Sept after 31.6 °C 19 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
8 Sept after 32.4 °C 20 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
9 Sept after 32.5 °C 18 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
10 Sept after 32.8 °C 16 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
11 Sept after 31.8 °C 18 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
12 Sept after 30.8 °C 18 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
13 Sept after 31.4 °C 17 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
14 Sept after 31.8 °C 17 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
15 Sept after 32.4 °C 19 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 18 Aug 2016
After · 12 Sept 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 · 440Every 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 Mwense fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 25 August 2016 and 5 September 2016: 12 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 10,696 hectares (107.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Mansa (6,000 ha, 0.8 %); Mwense (4,763 ha, 2.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 31.0 °C, humidity dropped to 21 % and gusts hit 51 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 48, class Very high.
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.