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Saurimo fire, 12 July 2017 Saurimo

Out · last detection 20 Jul 2017, 11:33 UTC

The fire started on 12 July 2017 in Saurimo, Angola, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 7,826 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 84th largest in Lunda Sul since 2016 (of 240 with a page). Number 53 in Angola in 2017, of 158.

Burnt area
7,826ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
8days
12 Jul 2017 – 19 Jul 2017
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
12 Jul
2017
Heat detections
222
in a single hotspot: 123 MW
Danger at start
37
High · FWI index
Energy released
1.7GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

20 Jul 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 12 Jul19 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

121314151617181920

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

The weather it burned in

33°high
37km/h · peak gust
14%lowest humidity

It had gone 55 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

29% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,302 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Saurimo where it started
    7,861 ha reached on 11 Jul
    0.3 %

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)
12 Jul 31.1 °C 23 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
13 Jul 31.3 °C 19 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
14 Jul 30.7 °C 22 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
15 Jul 31.8 °C 19 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
16 Jul 31.6 °C 19 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
17 Jul 33.4 °C 14 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
18 Jul 31.6 °C 17 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
19 Jul 32.2 °C 17 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
20 Jul after 32.6 °C 20 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
21 Jul after 32.2 °C 20 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
22 Jul after 32.9 °C 19 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
23 Jul after 32.4 °C 18 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
24 Jul after 32.7 °C 16 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
25 Jul after 32.9 °C 15 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
26 Jul after 32.0 °C 19 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
27 Jul after 30.7 °C 24 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
28 Jul after 31.0 °C 21 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
29 Jul after 30.6 °C 20 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 5 Jul 2017
After · 26 Jul 2017

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 · 222Every 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 Saurimo fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 12 July 2017 and 19 July 2017: 8 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 7,826 hectares (78.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Saurimo (7,861 ha, 0.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 33.4 °C, humidity dropped to 14 % and gusts hit 37 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 50, class Very high.
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.