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Mwinilunga fire, 14 September 2019 Mwinilunga, Kalumbila

Out · last detection 23 Sept 2019, 11:26 UTC

The fire started on 14 September 2019 in Mwinilunga, Zambia, and satellites saw it burning for 9 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,046 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 137th largest in North-Western since 2016 (of 286 with a page). Number 150 in Zambia in 2019, of 243.

Burnt area
4,046ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
9days
14 Sept 2019 – 22 Sept 2019
Municipalities hit
2
districts
Started on
14 Sept
2019
Heat detections
164
in a single hotspot: 182 MW
Danger at start
47
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
3.2GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

23 Sept 2019
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 14 Sept22 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

14151617181920212223

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

The weather it burned in

35°high
44km/h · peak gust
14%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 2.3 mm on 2 Oct.

This area had burned before

77% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 275 ha in 2016, 2,633 ha in 2017, 827 ha in 2018. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,122 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Mwinilunga where it started
    3,912 ha reached on 14 Sept
    0.2 %
  2. Kalumbila
    170 ha reached on 17 Sept
    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)
14 Sept 35.0 °C 14 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
15 Sept 34.5 °C 15 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
16 Sept 32.2 °C 23 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
17 Sept 33.0 °C 24 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
18 Sept 32.4 °C 17 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
19 Sept 33.5 °C 15 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
20 Sept 33.6 °C 15 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
21 Sept 33.4 °C 18 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
22 Sept 33.4 °C 18 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
23 Sept after 35.0 °C 21 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
24 Sept after 35.3 °C 19 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
25 Sept after 33.8 °C 17 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
26 Sept after 29.8 °C 26 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
27 Sept after 29.6 °C 20 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
28 Sept after 31.3 °C 15 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
29 Sept after 34.2 °C 11 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
30 Sept after 33.0 °C 23 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
1 Oct after 32.2 °C 27 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
2 Oct after 32.6 °C 31 % 40 km/h 2.3 mm Moderate 19

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 7 Sept 2019
After · 29 Sept 2019

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 · 164Every 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 Mwinilunga fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 14 September 2019 and 22 September 2019: 9 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 4,046 hectares (40.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Mwinilunga (3,912 ha, 0.2 %); Kalumbila (170 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 35.0 °C, humidity dropped to 14 % and gusts hit 44 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 50, 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.