Mwinilunga fire, 14 September 2025 Mwinilunga
The fire started on 14 September 2025 in Mwinilunga, Zambia, and satellites saw it burning for 10 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,164 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 125th largest in North-Western since 2016 (of 286 with a page). Number 140 in Zambia in 2025, of 271.
The power measured by the satellite is low (20.0 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.
- Burnt area
- 4,164ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 10days
- 14 Sept 2025 – 23 Sept 2025
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- districts
- Started on
- 14 Sept
- 2025
- Heat detections
- 89
- in a single hotspot: 20 MW
- Danger at start
- 42
- Very high · FWI index
- Energy released
- 641MW
- sum of detected power
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 4.4 mm on 29 Sept.
This area had burned before
68% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 826 ha in 2016, 645 ha in 2017, 1,255 ha in 2018, 679 ha in 2020, 963 ha in 2022. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,848 ha that had burned before.
What happened to each town
-
Mwinilunga where it started4,192 ha reached on 14 Sept0.2 %
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 | 31.6 °C | 19 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 15 Sept | 32.6 °C | 12 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 16 Sept | 33.7 °C | 9 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 50 |
| 17 Sept | 33.6 °C | 10 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 18 Sept | 34.6 °C | 9 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 19 Sept | 32.1 °C | 15 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 55 |
| 20 Sept | 33.2 °C | 20 % | 53 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 55 |
| 21 Sept | 32.5 °C | 15 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 22 Sept | 33.4 °C | 16 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 23 Sept | 34.1 °C | 13 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 24 Sept after | 34.4 °C | 10 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 51 |
| 25 Sept after | 32.8 °C | 15 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 26 Sept after | 33.7 °C | 12 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 56 |
| 27 Sept after | 33.0 °C | 17 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 28 Sept after | 33.5 °C | 22 % | 31 km/h | 0.1 mm | Very high 45 |
| 29 Sept after | 28.4 °C | 39 % | 29 km/h | 4.4 mm | Low 8 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
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 · CopernicusOn 15 September 2025 the air beside the fire reached 45 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 32: 2.1 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
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 · 89Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Mwinilunga fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 14 September 2025 and 23 September 2025: 10 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 4,164 hectares (41.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Mwinilunga (4,192 ha, 0.2 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 34.6 °C, humidity dropped to 9 % and gusts hit 53 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.
Report an error
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.