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Mzimba fire, 8 October 2016 Mzimba, Nkhata Bay

Out · last detection 23 Oct 2016, 10:55 UTC

The fire started on 8 October 2016 in Mzimba, Malawi, and satellites saw it burning for 16 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 6,937 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 22th largest in Northern Region since 2016 (of 418 with a page). Number 5 in Malawi in 2016, of 78.

Burnt area
6,937ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
16days
8 Oct 2016 – 23 Oct 2016
Municipalities hit
2
districts
Started on
8 Oct
2016
Heat detections
380
in a single hotspot: 261 MW
Danger at start
22
High · FWI index
Energy released
5.4GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

23 Oct 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 8 Oct23 Oct

How it evolved, day by day

8910111213141617181920212223

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

The weather it burned in

27°high
64km/h · peak gust
27%lowest humidity

It had gone 2 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 6.5 mm on 30 Oct.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Mzimba where it started
    6,696 ha reached on 8 Oct
    0.6 %
  2. Nkhata Bay
    289 ha reached on 12 Oct
    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)
8 Oct 24.9 °C 31 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
9 Oct 24.4 °C 35 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
10 Oct 23.4 °C 37 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
11 Oct 23.2 °C 39 % 57 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
12 Oct 24.6 °C 27 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
13 Oct 24.3 °C 30 % 56 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
14 Oct 24.0 °C 34 % 60 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
15 Oct 23.3 °C 37 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
16 Oct 25.2 °C 36 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
17 Oct 26.6 °C 36 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
18 Oct 24.1 °C 34 % 56 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
19 Oct 22.4 °C 36 % 63 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
20 Oct 23.4 °C 34 % 64 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
21 Oct 24.2 °C 35 % 59 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
22 Oct 25.6 °C 28 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
23 Oct 26.4 °C 30 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
24 Oct after 26.5 °C 31 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
25 Oct after 25.6 °C 35 % 47 km/h 0.6 mm High 25
26 Oct after 24.2 °C 41 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
27 Oct after 24.9 °C 32 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
28 Oct after 24.8 °C 40 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
29 Oct after 25.1 °C 42 % 45 km/h 0.4 mm High 26
30 Oct after 23.7 °C 46 % 37 km/h 6.5 mm Very low 4

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 1 Oct 2016
After · 30 Oct 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 · 380Every 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 Malawi ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Mzimba fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 8 October 2016 and 23 October 2016: 16 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 6,937 hectares (69.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Mzimba (6,696 ha, 0.6 %); Nkhata Bay (289 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 26.6 °C, humidity dropped to 27 % and gusts hit 64 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 32, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Malawi (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.