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Rivungo fire, 23 July 2016 Rivungo

Out · last detection 1 Aug 2016, 11:50 UTC

The fire started on 23 July 2016 in Rivungo, Angola, and satellites saw it burning for 9 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 5,973 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 480th largest in Cuando Cubango since 2016 (of 659 with a page). Number 84 in Angola in 2016, of 138.

Burnt area
5,973ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
9days
23 Jul 2016 – 31 Jul 2016
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
23 Jul
2016
Heat detections
187
in a single hotspot: 276 MW
Danger at start
41
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
4.9GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

1 Aug 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 23 Jul31 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

2324252627282930311

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

The weather it burned in

32°high
34km/h · peak gust
9%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. Rivungo where it started
    6,026 ha reached on 23 Jul
    0.2 %

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)
23 Jul 27.4 °C 12 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
24 Jul 27.8 °C 15 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
25 Jul 29.0 °C 13 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
26 Jul 27.8 °C 12 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
27 Jul 29.1 °C 12 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
28 Jul 29.7 °C 12 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
29 Jul 30.8 °C 11 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
30 Jul 31.5 °C 10 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
31 Jul 31.6 °C 9 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
1 Aug after 30.3 °C 16 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
2 Aug after 29.8 °C 10 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
3 Aug after 30.5 °C 7 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
4 Aug after 25.8 °C 14 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
5 Aug after 27.9 °C 10 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
6 Aug after 27.6 °C 18 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
7 Aug after 27.9 °C 11 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
8 Aug after 27.9 °C 13 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
9 Aug after 28.2 °C 20 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
10 Aug after 27.4 °C 27 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 16 Jul 2016
After · 7 Aug 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 · 187Every 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 Angola ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Rivungo fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 23 July 2016 and 31 July 2016: 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 5,973 hectares (59.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Rivungo (6,026 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 31.6 °C, humidity dropped to 9 % and gusts hit 34 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 50, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Angola (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 (Public Domain). 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.