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Rufunsa fire, November 2021 Kafue, Rufunsa

Out · last detection 11 Nov 2021, 23:50 UTC

The fire started on 5 November 2021 in Rufunsa, Zambia, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 7,107 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 20th largest in Lusaka since 2016 (of 77 with a page). Number 48 in Zambia in 2021, of 213.

Burnt area
7,107ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
7days
5 Nov 2021 – 11 Nov 2021
Municipalities hit
2
districts
Started on
5 Nov
2021
Heat detections
288
in a single hotspot: 33 MW
Danger at start
46
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
1.8GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

11 Nov 2021
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 5 Nov11 Nov

How it evolved, day by day

567891011

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

The weather it burned in

38°high
52km/h · peak gust
18%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 2.3 mm on 21 Nov.

This area had burned before

92% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 4,457 ha in 2016, 5,480 ha in 2018, 1,702 ha in 2019. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 6,564 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Kafue
    6,100 ha reached on 3 Nov
    1.4 %
  2. Rufunsa where it started
    1,049 ha reached on 2 Nov
    0.1 %

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)
5 Nov 33.6 °C 30 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
6 Nov 35.4 °C 20 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
7 Nov 35.7 °C 18 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
8 Nov 36.5 °C 18 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
9 Nov 37.5 °C 19 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
10 Nov 36.9 °C 20 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
11 Nov 32.8 °C 32 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
12 Nov after 33.4 °C 32 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
13 Nov after 32.3 °C 30 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
14 Nov after 31.6 °C 32 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
15 Nov after 33.3 °C 33 % 56 km/h 0.3 mm Very high 45
16 Nov after 33.2 °C 28 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
17 Nov after 35.6 °C 20 % 41 km/h 0.1 mm Very high 46
18 Nov after 36.8 °C 19 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
19 Nov after 35.3 °C 21 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
20 Nov after 31.3 °C 35 % 46 km/h 0.3 mm Very high 40
21 Nov after 29.5 °C 43 % 52 km/h 2.3 mm Moderate 17

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 29 Oct 2021
After · 18 Nov 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 · 288Every 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 Rufunsa fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 5 November 2021 and 11 November 2021: 7 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 7,107 hectares (71.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Kafue (6,100 ha, 1.4 %); Rufunsa (1,049 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 37.5 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 52 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 54, 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.

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.