How long did the Namtumbo fire last?

According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 30 September 2026 to 1 November 2026 (33 days). The perimeter dates it from 6 October 2026 to 25 October 2026.

How much area did it burn?

The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 11,666 hectares (116.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire only entered Namtumbo (11,721 ha, 0.5 %).

Is the Namtumbo fire still active?

No fire detections since 1 Nov 2026, 11:25 UTC. A lack of detections is not an official extinction.

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 36.3 °C, humidity dropped to 22 % and gusts hit 40 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 41, class Very high.

Where does this data come from?

From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Tanzania (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

TZ · Tanzania · 2026-09-30 → 2026-11-01

Namtumbo fire, 30 September 2026 Namtumbo

Dying down · last detection 1 Nov 2026, 11:25 UTC

The fire started on 30 September 2026 in Namtumbo, Tanzania, and satellites saw it burning for 33 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 11,666 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 5th largest in Ruvuma since 2016 (of 94 with a page). Number 19 in Tanzania in 2026, of 220.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Namtumbo · 2025 Namtumbo · 2022 Namtumbo · 2025 Namtumbo · 2021

Is it still active?

No detections since 1 Nov 2026, 11:25 UTC. That usually means no flame is visible from space any more, although hotspots may remain. Satellites pass a few times a day and cloud or smoke can hide the fire: a lack of detections is not an official extinction. Each country’s emergency service declares a fire contained or out.

Burnt area: 11,666ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 33days; 30 Sept 2026 – 1 Nov 2026
Municipalities hit: 1; districts
Started on: 30 Sept; 2026
Heat detections: 255; in a single hotspot: 60 MW
Danger at start: 28; High · FWI index
Average daily power: 102MW; detected power per day, on average

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 30 Sept1 Nov

Play back 1 Nov 2026

How it evolved, day by day

30 Sept 8 Oct 13 Oct 17 Oct 19 Oct 21 Oct 25 Oct 1 Nov

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

40km/h · peak gust

22%lowest humidity

It had gone 4 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

21% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 58 ha in 2016, 715 ha in 2018, 1,620 ha in 2021.

How big is it?

It burned the equivalent of 7.4% of the area of London (117 km² against 1,583 km²).

London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).

This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.

What happened to each town

Namtumbo where it started

11,721 ha reached on 30 Sept

0.5 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.

People and buildings inside the perimeter

GHSL 2025

Built-up area8.1 ha

Residents≈ 900

Inside the perimeter there were about 8.1 hectares of built-up land and about 900 residents (GHSL 2025, satellite-based estimate).

This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned. The GHSL 2025 epoch is a projection made from 2020 and earlier data.

Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu

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) · forecast models, provisional until the ERA5 reanalysis arrives

Day	High	Min. humidity	Peak gust	Rain	Danger (FWI)
30 Sept	29.6 °C	34 %	31 km/h	0.2 mm	High 28
1 Oct	29.3 °C	42 %	27 km/h	5.1 mm	Low 6
2 Oct	30.4 °C	39 %	32 km/h	2.6 mm	Low 8
3 Oct	30.6 °C	30 %	32 km/h	0.6 mm	Moderate 21
4 Oct	28.5 °C	48 %	38 km/h	0.7 mm	Moderate 18
5 Oct	28.6 °C	45 %	36 km/h	4.1 mm	Very low 5
6 Oct	33.6 °C	28 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	High 22
7 Oct	28.7 °C	44 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	High 22
8 Oct	32.4 °C	26 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	High 27
9 Oct	33.0 °C	27 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	High 27
10 Oct	33.4 °C	28 %	33 km/h	0.2 mm	High 28
11 Oct	31.4 °C	35 %	34 km/h	1.1 mm	Moderate 19
12 Oct	31.9 °C	33 %	31 km/h	0.8 mm	High 22
13 Oct	32.0 °C	31 %	30 km/h	1.0 mm	High 23
14 Oct	30.7 °C	38 %	31 km/h	1.4 mm	Moderate 17
15 Oct	31.1 °C	29 %	33 km/h	0.8 mm	High 24
16 Oct	32.1 °C	26 %	30 km/h	0.2 mm	High 29
17 Oct	31.3 °C	31 %	29 km/h	0.4 mm	High 29
18 Oct	28.5 °C	38 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	High 29
19 Oct	29.3 °C	43 %	34 km/h	0.1 mm	High 27
20 Oct	33.6 °C	32 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	High 29
21 Oct	34.3 °C	31 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	High 30
22 Oct	35.2 °C	28 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	High 33
23 Oct	35.7 °C	22 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
24 Oct	34.5 °C	22 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38
25 Oct	33.9 °C	25 %	39 km/h	0.1 mm	Very high 41
26 Oct	33.2 °C	33 %	35 km/h	1.0 mm	High 28
27 Oct	34.9 °C	23 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	High 38
28 Oct	34.1 °C	26 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
29 Oct	36.3 °C	22 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38
30 Oct	32.3 °C	34 %	33 km/h	3.7 mm	Low 11
31 Oct	32.1 °C	38 %	23 km/h	6.7 mm	Low 5
1 Nov	31.3 °C	43 %	32 km/h	1.6 mm	Low 10
2 Nov after	33.2 °C	31 %	31 km/h	0.1 mm	High 23

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 23 Sept 2026

After · 1 Nov 2026

Before After

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 · Copernicus

On 10 October 2026 the air beside the fire reached 42 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 20: 1.3 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak42 µg/m³

Days over the guideline5 days

PM1043 µg/m³

Optical depth0.54

WHO 15

2829301234567891011121314151617181920212223242526

Good Fair Moderate Poor Very poor Extremely poor

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 · 255Every 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 time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Tanzania ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Namtumbo fire last?: According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 30 September 2026 to 1 November 2026 (33 days). The perimeter dates it from 6 October 2026 to 25 October 2026.
How much area did it burn?: The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 11,666 hectares (116.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire only entered Namtumbo (11,721 ha, 0.5 %).
Is the Namtumbo fire still active?: No fire detections since 1 Nov 2026, 11:25 UTC. A lack of detections is not an official extinction.
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 36.3 °C, humidity dropped to 22 % and gusts hit 40 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 41, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?: From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Tanzania (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.

Emergency number: 112 · Emergency number and official warnings ›

Satellite cross-check

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · Copernicus ↗

History of this page · 1 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.

1 November 2026 Last day with fire: 24 October 2026 → 29 October 2026.

RSS Changes to this page

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

What do you think is wrong?

Dates or duration Place or towns Burned area Name It was not a wildfire Same fire as another page Something else

What really happened?

Your connection to the fire (optional) Email (optional)

We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy. This is not an emergency service: if there is a fire now, call 112.

How we know this

Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery; 2 polygons grouped in this page.
Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 6 October 2026 to 25 October 2026. 255 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
We have not matched this page with any official record.
Weather: ECMWF IFS model, provisional until the ERA5 reanalysis arrives.
Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2025, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.

How we build fire pages: methodology ›

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.