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NA · Namibia · →

Outjo fire, 9 September 2021 Outjo

Out · last detection 17 Sept 2021, 13:11 UTC

The fire started on 9 September 2021 in Outjo, Namibia, and satellites saw it burning for 9 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 6,361 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 22th largest in Kunene since 2016 (of 62 with a page). Number 37 in Namibia in 2021, of 175.

Burnt area
6,361ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
9days
9 Sept 2021 – 17 Sept 2021
Municipalities hit
1
constituencies
Started on
9 Sept
2021
Heat detections
208
in a single hotspot: 48 MW
Danger at start
59
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
1.9GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

17 Sept 2021
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 9 Sept17 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

91011121314151617

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
54km/h · peak gust
8%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

8% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 520 ha in 2017.

What happened to each town

  1. Outjo where it started
    6,383 ha reached on 9 Sept
    0.8 %

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)
9 Sept 33.4 °C 17 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 59
10 Sept 33.3 °C 16 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 65
11 Sept 32.0 °C 14 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 72
12 Sept 31.9 °C 11 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
13 Sept 32.4 °C 12 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
14 Sept 33.5 °C 10 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 59
15 Sept 33.8 °C 10 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 66
16 Sept 34.6 °C 9 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
17 Sept 33.7 °C 8 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
18 Sept after 33.9 °C 10 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 62
19 Sept after 33.2 °C 14 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
20 Sept after 34.2 °C 9 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 64
21 Sept after 35.6 °C 9 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
22 Sept after 35.7 °C 12 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
23 Sept after 36.3 °C 9 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
24 Sept after 36.4 °C 10 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 59
25 Sept after 36.1 °C 10 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 66
26 Sept after 36.2 °C 9 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 66
27 Sept after 35.2 °C 9 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 65

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 2 Sept 2021
After · 24 Sept 2021

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 · 208Every 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 Namibia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Outjo fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 9 September 2021 and 17 September 2021: 9 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 6,361 hectares (63.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Outjo (6,383 ha, 0.8 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 34.6 °C, humidity dropped to 8 % and gusts hit 54 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 72, class Very extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Namibia (OCHA COD-AB). 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 OCHA COD-AB (Namibia Statistics Agency (NSA)) (Creative Commons Attribution for Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY-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.