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Nyimba fire, 1 September 2016 Nyimba

Out · last detection 17 Sept 2016, 23:17 UTC

The fire started on 1 September 2016 in Nyimba, Zambia, and satellites saw it burning for 16 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 28,146 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the largest fire in Eastern since 2016 (of 59 with a page). Number 10 in Zambia in 2016, of 246.

Burnt area
28,146ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
16days
1 Sept 2016 – 16 Sept 2016
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
1 Sept
2016
Heat detections
980
in a single hotspot: 61 MW
Danger at start
35
High · FWI index
Energy released
5.2GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

17 Sept 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 1 Sept16 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

1234567891011121314151617

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

The weather it burned in

35°high
40km/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

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

What happened to each town

  1. Nyimba where it started
    28,333 ha reached on 30 Aug
    2.7 %

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)
30 Aug 29.1 °C 22 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
31 Aug 28.8 °C 28 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
1 Sept 28.1 °C 23 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
2 Sept 27.7 °C 24 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
3 Sept 27.7 °C 23 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
4 Sept 29.0 °C 24 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
5 Sept 29.4 °C 27 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
6 Sept 30.1 °C 24 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
7 Sept 29.9 °C 24 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
8 Sept 31.2 °C 23 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
9 Sept 33.7 °C 17 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
10 Sept 33.1 °C 15 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
11 Sept 31.8 °C 22 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
12 Sept 31.6 °C 24 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
13 Sept 31.8 °C 21 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
14 Sept 32.2 °C 17 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
15 Sept 31.9 °C 22 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
16 Sept 33.3 °C 20 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
17 Sept after 34.5 °C 16 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
18 Sept after 35.1 °C 20 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
19 Sept after 32.5 °C 21 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
20 Sept after 30.1 °C 27 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
21 Sept after 31.3 °C 21 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
22 Sept after 32.0 °C 23 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
23 Sept after 33.0 °C 19 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
24 Sept after 34.4 °C 16 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
25 Sept after 34.6 °C 12 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
26 Sept after 33.8 °C 17 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
27 Sept after 32.6 °C 20 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
28 Sept after 33.9 °C 19 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
29 Sept after 35.6 °C 16 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 25 Aug 2016
After · 23 Sept 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 · 980Every 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 Zambia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Nyimba fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 1 September 2016 and 16 September 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 28,146 hectares (281.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Nyimba (28,333 ha, 2.7 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 35.1 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 40 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 48, class Very high.
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.

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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 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.