Rapale fire, 25 September 2025 Mogovolas, Rapale, Murrupula
The fire started on 25 September 2025 in Rapale, Mozambique, and satellites saw it burning for 15 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 7,722 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.
It is the 66th largest in Nampula since 2016 (of 393 with a page). Number 68 in Mozambique in 2025, of 313.
- Burnt area
- 7,722ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 15days
- 25 Sept 2025 – 9 Oct 2025
- Municipalities hit
- 3
- districts
- Started on
- 25 Sept
- 2025
- Heat detections
- 162
- in a single hotspot: 33 MW
- Danger at start
- 39
- Very high · FWI index
- Energy released
- 1.3GW
- sum of detected power
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone 52 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
91% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,286 ha in 2016, 2,670 ha in 2017, 1,533 ha in 2018, 2,706 ha in 2019, 4,981 ha in 2020, 1,206 ha in 2021, 2,194 ha in 2022, 619 ha in 2023, 3,568 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 7,061 ha that had burned before.
- 4,461 ha Mogovolas fire, August 2020 9,645 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,746 ha Mogovolas fire, September 2024 24,027 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,110 ha Mogovolas fire, September 2019 4,035 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,575 ha Mogovolas fire, September 2017 4,784 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,127 ha Mogovolas fire, October 2022 7,845 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,096 ha Murrupula fire, September 2018 3,508 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 540 ha Mogovolas fire, September 2016 3,286 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
5,959 ha reached on 26 Sept1.3 %
-
Rapale where it started1,576 ha reached on 25 Sept0.4 %
-
224 ha reached on 28 Sept0.1 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 25 Sept | 32.6 °C | 31 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 26 Sept | 30.2 °C | 39 % | 41 km/h | 0.3 mm | High 38 |
| 27 Sept | 27.7 °C | 51 % | 37 km/h | 0.7 mm | High 22 |
| 28 Sept | 31.6 °C | 37 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 29 Sept | 34.3 °C | 31 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 38 |
| 30 Sept | 32.7 °C | 37 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 1 Oct | 28.0 °C | 53 % | 48 km/h | 2.2 mm | Moderate 14 |
| 2 Oct | 27.8 °C | 40 % | 41 km/h | 0.5 mm | High 25 |
| 3 Oct | 27.8 °C | 42 % | 41 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 28 |
| 4 Oct | 27.4 °C | 45 % | 49 km/h | 0.7 mm | High 27 |
| 5 Oct | 28.1 °C | 49 % | 40 km/h | 2.1 mm | Moderate 12 |
| 6 Oct | 30.6 °C | 41 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 23 |
| 7 Oct | 32.2 °C | 39 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 8 Oct | 32.6 °C | 34 % | 34 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 30 |
| 9 Oct | 32.8 °C | 39 % | 36 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 30 |
| 10 Oct after | 32.4 °C | 32 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 11 Oct after | 33.7 °C | 32 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 12 Oct after | 34.7 °C | 29 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 35 |
| 13 Oct after | 34.4 °C | 25 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 14 Oct after | 33.4 °C | 30 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 15 Oct after | 34.3 °C | 26 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 16 Oct after | 34.4 °C | 25 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 17 Oct after | 32.9 °C | 31 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 18 Oct after | 31.0 °C | 42 % | 35 km/h | 0.6 mm | High 31 |
| 19 Oct after | 32.5 °C | 37 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
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 · CopernicusOn 4 October 2025 the air beside the fire reached 22 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).
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 · 162Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 51,629 haMogovolas1 September 2026 · 28 days · 6 km away
- 24,027 haMogovolas15 September 2024 · 8 days · 12 km away
- 29,696 haRapaleSeptember 2016 · 23 days · 30 km away
- 26,065 haRapale2 September 2025 · 24 days · 32 km away
- 31,412 haRapaleSeptember 2017 · 17 days · 37 km away
- 17,139 haRapaleSeptember 2021 · 19 days · 37 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Rapale fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 25 September 2025 and 9 October 2025: 15 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 7,722 hectares (77.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 3 municipalities: Mogovolas (5,959 ha, 1.3 %); Rapale (1,576 ha, 0.4 %); Murrupula (224 ha, 0.1 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 34.3 °C, humidity dropped to 31 % and gusts hit 49 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 39, 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.
Report an error
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.