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Ngauma fire, 4 October 2023 Ngauma

Out · last detection 17 Oct 2023, 10:41 UTC

The fire started on 4 October 2023 in Ngauma, Mozambique, and satellites saw it burning for 14 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 11,441 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 46th largest in Niassa since 2016 (of 577 with a page). Number 14 in Mozambique in 2023, of 128.

Burnt area
11,441ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
14days
4 Oct 2023 – 17 Oct 2023
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
4 Oct
2023
Heat detections
616
in a single hotspot: 123 MW
Danger at start
29
High · FWI index
Energy released
7.0GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

17 Oct 2023
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 4 Oct17 Oct

How it evolved, day by day

4567891011121314151617

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

The weather it burned in

34°high
42km/h · peak gust
22%lowest humidity

It had gone 14 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.9 mm on 20 Oct.

This area had burned before

32% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 165 ha in 2016, 164 ha in 2018, 3,368 ha in 2022.

What happened to each town

  1. Ngauma where it started
    11,507 ha reached on 28 Sept
    3.8 %

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)
28 Sept 28.0 °C 41 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
29 Sept 27.0 °C 47 % 40 km/h 0.6 mm High 22
30 Sept 29.7 °C 35 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
1 Oct 32.5 °C 25 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
2 Oct 30.4 °C 33 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
3 Oct 27.1 °C 43 % 38 km/h 0.8 mm High 24
4 Oct 29.1 °C 32 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
5 Oct 29.3 °C 34 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
6 Oct 30.9 °C 33 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
7 Oct 31.3 °C 33 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
8 Oct 33.7 °C 26 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
9 Oct 32.0 °C 32 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
10 Oct 30.8 °C 35 % 40 km/h 0.1 mm High 37
11 Oct 30.4 °C 34 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
12 Oct 32.8 °C 28 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
13 Oct 34.1 °C 28 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
14 Oct 34.3 °C 22 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
15 Oct 33.2 °C 30 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
16 Oct 33.5 °C 36 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
17 Oct 32.3 °C 32 % 42 km/h 0.2 mm Very high 39
18 Oct after 30.4 °C 37 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
19 Oct after 29.5 °C 42 % 35 km/h 0.1 mm High 31
20 Oct after 27.0 °C 55 % 34 km/h 1.9 mm Low 11

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 27 Sept 2023
After · 24 Oct 2023

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 · 616Every 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 Mozambique ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Ngauma fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 4 October 2023 and 17 October 2023: 14 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 11,441 hectares (114.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Ngauma (11,507 ha, 3.8 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 34.3 °C, humidity dropped to 22 % and gusts hit 42 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 40, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Mozambique (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.