Burned area
satellite only4,746ha
Perimeter published by GWIS (Copernicus).
- Source
- GWIS (Copernicus)
- Date
- 10 Aug 2019 – 24 Aug 2019
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page to compare it with.
ZM · Zambia · –
Nsama fire, 10 August 2019 Mporokoso, Nsama
Out · last detection 24 Aug 2019, 10:49 UTC
The fire started on 10 August 2019 in Nsama, Zambia, and satellites saw it burning for 15 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,746 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.
It is the 186th largest in Northern since 2016 (of 437 with a page). Number 102 in Zambia in 2019, of 243.
Use this data
Compare with…
Use this data
Fire page data · version 2026-11-15matches the official recordwith caveatssatellite onlymodel
When copying, the sentence is
Tick the figures you want: they make up the lede and the CSV.
Duration by satellite
satellite only15days
10 Aug 2019 to 24 Aug 2019: first and last day with fire on the page.
- Source
- GWIS (Copernicus) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- last detection: 24 Aug 2019, 10:49 UTC
+− cross-check
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.
Start
satellite only10 Aug 2019
First day with fire seen by the satellites or the perimeter.
- Source
- GWIS (Copernicus) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- 10 Aug 2019
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page, so the alert time and the cause are not known here.
Hotspots
satellite only183
VIIRS detections at 375 m. Most intense hotspot: 76 MW.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (Suomi NPP)
- Date
- 10 Aug 2019 – 24 Aug 2019
+− cross-check
There is no official record to compare with. Each hotspot is a pixel detected in one satellite pass, not a separate fire.
The worst day
satellite only629MW
Total radiative power on 19 August 2019; hotspots that day: 48.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (FRP)
- Date
- 19 Aug 2019
+− cross-check
Fire radiative power (FRP) measures the energy the fire gives off when the satellite passes. Added up by day, it compares intensity, not area.
Danger at the start
model48.0FWI · very high
Fire Weather Index (Canadian system) computed by WorldFires for the day the fire started. Consecutive days without rain before: 60.
- Source
- WorldFires calculation (Canadian FWI system)
- Date
- 10 Aug 2019, local noon
- Model
- ERA5 0,25° (ECMWF · Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com
+− cross-check
This is an index computed from weather model data, not a measurement of the fire nor an official warning. Danger warnings are issued by each country’s authority. Emergency number and official warnings
Weather during the fire
model29.6°C · 15% RH
High of 29.6 °C and minimum humidity of 15% on 13 August 2019; gusts of 55 km/h on 16 August 2019.
- Source
- weather model at the fire’s grid cell
- Date
- 10 Aug 2019 – 24 Aug 2019
- Model
- ERA5 0,25° (ECMWF · Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com
+− cross-check
These are model values for a cell of about 25 km, not from a weather station: they may differ from what was measured on the ground.
This page’s change log has been kept since 24 October 2026: every night what it publishes is compared and the difference is logged. Anything earlier is reconstructed from each source’s date and marked as reconstructed.
Show
-
logName: Mporokoso → Nsama.
-
· reconstructed weatherWeather and FWI computed from the ERA5 reanalysis
-
logLast day with fire: 22 August 2019 → 24 August 2019.
-
logStart date: 14 August 2019 → 10 August 2019.
Area logged each night
Move the slider to see which area the page published each day.
Versioned permanent link
https://worldfires.org/en/fire/nsama-2019-08-4?v=2026-11-15A version keeps the area, dates, name and official record; the area as it was logged (changes under 2% are not logged). The map, hotspots and weather always show today’s data.
Citation
A lede of about 60 words figures only, no adjectives
CSV for this fire nsama-2019-08-4.csv · daily, no individual hotspots
| fecha | focos_viirs | frp_mw | tmax_c | tmin_c | hr_min_pct | viento_max_kmh | racha_max_kmh | precip_mm | fwi | clase_fwi | dentro_del_incendio |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019-08-10 | 1 | 0 | 28.3 | 15.8 | 24 | 18.4 | 43.2 | 0 | 48 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2019-08-11 | 0 | 0 | 27.5 | 14.8 | 23 | 19 | 43.2 | 0 | 47.8 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2019-08-12 | 3 | 41 | 29.1 | 16.2 | 20 | 15.5 | 36.4 | 0 | 42.4 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2019-08-13 | 6 | 9 | 29.6 | 16.3 | 15 | 18 | 40 | 0 | 50.6 | extremo | 1 |
| 2019-08-14 | 0 | 0 | 27.9 | 15.3 | 15 | 18.8 | 45.7 | 0 | 60.5 | extremo | 1 |
| 2019-08-15 | 16 | 179 | 26.2 | 14.8 | 22 | 22.5 | 53.3 | 0 | 67.2 | extremo | 1 |
| 2019-08-16 | 48 | 605 | 25.7 | 15.1 | 25 | 24 | 54.7 | 0 | 58.8 | extremo | 1 |
| 2019-08-17 | 11 | 108 | 27.2 | 15.5 | 25 | 18.1 | 39.2 | 0 | 42.7 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2019-08-18 | 8 | 142 | 27.5 | 16.4 | 22 | 19.1 | 44.3 | 0 | 46.8 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2019-08-19 | 48 | 629 | 26.9 | 14.4 | 23 | 20 | 45.7 | 0 | 43.5 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2019-08-20 | 8 | 109 | 27 | 14.1 | 21 | 19.7 | 45 | 0 | 48.1 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2019-08-21 | 10 | 76 | 26.2 | 13.4 | 23 | 23.5 | 54 | 0 | 52.6 | extremo | 1 |
| 2019-08-22 | 18 | 254 | 25.8 | 13.2 | 26 | 21.1 | 48.2 | 0 | 47.7 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2019-08-23 | 2 | 6 | 27.1 | 14.4 | 28 | 18.3 | 43.2 | 0 | 42.7 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2019-08-24 | 4 | 39 | 28.1 | 14.7 | 25 | 19.9 | 46.1 | 0 | 45.7 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2019-08-25 | 0 | 0 | 28.3 | 16.5 | 25 | 18.4 | 43.9 | 0 | 47.1 | muy_alto | 0 |
| 2019-08-26 | 0 | 0 | 29.6 | 18.3 | 25 | 15.3 | 39.2 | 0 | 45.4 | muy_alto | 0 |
| 2019-08-27 | 0 | 0 | 30.4 | 18.5 | 20 | 14.2 | 33.5 | 0 | 44.1 | muy_alto | 0 |
| 2019-08-28 | 0 | 0 | 31.2 | 16.9 | 18 | 14 | 34.9 | 0 | 40.9 | muy_alto | 0 |
| 2019-08-29 | 0 | 0 | 30.9 | 15.9 | 15 | 12.3 | 30.2 | 0 | 43.3 | muy_alto | 0 |
| 2019-08-30 | 0 | 0 | 31.1 | 17.1 | 16 | 13.7 | 35.3 | 0 | 50.1 | extremo | 0 |
| 2019-08-31 | 0 | 0 | 31 | 16.8 | 18 | 13.8 | 27 | 0 | 43.3 | muy_alto | 0 |
| 2019-09-01 | 0 | 0 | 31.6 | 14.5 | 16 | 12.1 | 31 | 0 | 45.4 | muy_alto | 0 |
| 2019-09-02 | 0 | 0 | 31.6 | 18.3 | 18 | 20.6 | 43.6 | 0 | 60.7 | extremo | 0 |
| 2019-09-03 | 0 | 0 | 29.7 | 17.4 | 19 | 20.1 | 45.7 | 0 | 65.4 | extremo | 0 |
It is generated in your browser from this page’s data: one file per fire, aggregated by day and without individual hotspots.
Live widget for your story
It updates itself while the fire is still active and links to this page. Free, with the attribution shown at the bottom.
Sources for this page: GWIS (Copernicus), NASA FIRMS (VIIRS), ERA5 (ECMWF/Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0). Open-Meteo.com · How we build fire pages: methodology
- Burnt area
- 4,746ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 15days
- 10 Aug 2019 – 24 Aug 2019
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- districts
- Started on
- 10 Aug
- 2019
- Heat detections
- 183
- in a single hotspot: 76 MW
- Danger at start
- 48
- Very high · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 169MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
HOTSPOTS BY DAY
10 Aug24 Aug
24 Aug 2019
How it evolved, day by day
10 Aug
15 Aug
19 Aug
24 Aug
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
30°high
55km/h · peak gust
15%lowest humidity
It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
73% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,986 ha in 2017, 2,982 ha in 2018. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,461 ha that had burned before.
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
Berlin boundary: geoBoundaries · Federal Agency for Cartography and Geodesy (dl-de/by-2-0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
2,717 ha0.6 %
-
Nsama where it started2,060 ha0.3 %
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.
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)
Started with 60 days without rain: 91 % of the area in Zambia
| Day | High | Min. humidity | Peak gust | Rain | Danger (FWI) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10 Aug | 28.3 °C | 24 % | 43 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 11 Aug | 27.5 °C | 23 % | 43 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 12 Aug | 29.1 °C | 20 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 13 Aug | 29.6 °C | 15 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 51 |
| 14 Aug | 27.9 °C | 15 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 60 |
| 15 Aug | 26.2 °C | 22 % | 53 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 67 |
| 16 Aug | 25.7 °C | 25 % | 55 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 59 |
| 17 Aug | 27.2 °C | 25 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 18 Aug | 27.5 °C | 22 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 19 Aug | 26.9 °C | 23 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 20 Aug | 27.0 °C | 21 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 21 Aug | 26.2 °C | 23 % | 54 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 53 |
| 22 Aug | 25.8 °C | 26 % | 48 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 23 Aug | 27.1 °C | 28 % | 43 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 24 Aug | 28.1 °C | 25 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 25 Aug after | 28.3 °C | 25 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 26 Aug after | 29.6 °C | 25 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 27 Aug after | 30.4 °C | 20 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 28 Aug after | 31.2 °C | 18 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 29 Aug after | 30.9 °C | 15 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 30 Aug after | 31.1 °C | 16 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 50 |
| 31 Aug after | 31.0 °C | 18 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 1 Sept after | 31.6 °C | 16 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 2 Sept after | 31.6 °C | 18 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 61 |
| 3 Sept after | 29.7 °C | 19 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 65 |
Its twins: fires that started in the same weather
It started with an FWI of 48.0, a minimum humidity of 24% and more than two months without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2016: 32.
FWI at the start
48.0
Minimum humidity
24 %
Days without rain
60+
this fire
chosen twins
rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar
Outlines of the closest twins
This fire · Nsama fire, 10 August 2019
4,746 ha
15 days
FWI 48.0
Min. humidity 24 %
Mporokoso fire, August 2018
4,818 ha
16 days
FWI 47.2
Min. humidity 24 %
24 km away, in 2018
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 6.4 mm on 10 Sept.
Mporokoso fire, August 2024
17,644 ha
27 days
FWI 45.9
Min. humidity 24 %
30 km away, in 2024
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
Luwingu fire, August 2024
4,148 ha
18 days
FWI 47.8
Min. humidity 24 %
156 km away, in 2024
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
Kawambwa fire, August 2016
3,044 ha
14 days
FWI 46.3
Min. humidity 24 %
89 km away, in 2016
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
Kawambwa fire, August 2016
19,930 ha
29 days
FWI 49.0
Min. humidity 24 %
131 km away, in 2016
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
What happened to them
- 18 days
- median duration
- 4,695 ha
- median area
- 16 %
- went past 10,000 ha
- 4.2 mm
- rain at the end (median; 5 of 32 had it)
It burned an area similar to its twins (4,746 ha against a median of 4,695 ha) and lasted 15 days, against 18 days.
In 27 of 32, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 4.2 mm.
This is a bank of analogues: it shows what usually happens, not what will happen. With fewer than 15 twins we give no figures. How we calculate it
How it ended
—first rain
—no rain in ten days
55km/h · max. gust
It was considered over on 24 Aug, and not even 1 mm fell in the following ten days: it went out without rain. Twins with rain when they ended: 5 of 32, with a median of 4.2 mm.
Weather on this page: Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)
How a twin is chosen
- Same area: fires that have already ended, less than 250 km from this one, since 2016.
- Same start: we compare the FWI on the first day, the minimum humidity that day and the run of days without rain before it. The slider sets how much they may differ.
- Only pages with final weather data (ERA5 reanalysis) calculated in the same way as this fire’s; agricultural and grass burns and pages with data under review are left out.
- Fires burning at the same time as this one (a week before or after) are left out: they share the same spell of weather and do not count as a precedent.
- They are sorted by similarity, and the outlines of the first five are drawn.
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
↔
Before · 3 Aug 2019
After · 31 Aug 2019
Sentinel-2 did not pass over on that day. Try another date, or use false colour, which is daily.
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 · 183Every 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
- 29,594 haMporokoso9 August 2026 · 43 days · 6 km away
- 45,873 haMporokoso12 August 2025 · 40 days · 22 km away
- 64,651 haMporokoso12 August 2017 · 37 days · 24 km away
- 57,925 haMporokoso8 August 2026 · 50 days · 24 km away
- 34,222 haMporokoso10 August 2019 · 35 days · 30 km away
- 36,039 haMporokoso5 August 2018 · 35 days · 31 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Nsama fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 10 August 2019 to 24 August 2019 (15 days). The perimeter dates it from 14 August 2019 to 22 August 2019.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 4,746 hectares (47.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Mporokoso (2,717 ha, 0.6 %); Nsama (2,060 ha, 0.3 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 29.6 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 55 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 67, 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.
- How did the fires that started in similar weather in this area end?
- Fires less than 250 km away that started since 2016 with a similar FWI, humidity and dry spell: 32. Their median duration was 18 days and their median area 4,695 ha; 16 % went past 10,000 ha. In 27 of 32, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 4.2 mm.
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
History of this page · 3 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
- Name: Mporokoso → Nsama.
- Last day with fire: 22 August 2019 → 24 August 2019.
- Start date: 14 August 2019 → 10 August 2019.
RSS Changes to this page With cross-checks and a citable version
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
How we know this
- Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery.
- Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 14 August 2019 to 22 August 2019. 183 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
- We have not matched this page with any official record.
- Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
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.