Skip to content
worldfires
AO · Angola · →

Saurimo fire, 14 July 2018 Saurimo

Out · last detection 24 Jul 2018, 12:54 UTC

The fire started on 14 July 2018 in Saurimo, Angola, and satellites saw it burning for 10 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 6,214 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 145th largest in Lunda Sul since 2016 (of 240 with a page). Number 60 in Angola in 2018, of 100.

Burnt area
6,214ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
10days
14 Jul 2018 – 23 Jul 2018
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
14 Jul
2018
Heat detections
201
in a single hotspot: 191 MW
Danger at start
43
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
2.4GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

24 Jul 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 14 Jul23 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

1415161718192021222324

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
48km/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

41% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,663 ha in 2016, 1,118 ha in 2017. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,566 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Saurimo where it started
    6,240 ha reached on 14 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)
14 Jul 31.6 °C 17 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
15 Jul 31.9 °C 17 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
16 Jul 31.4 °C 19 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
17 Jul 29.7 °C 17 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
18 Jul 28.5 °C 22 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
19 Jul 29.9 °C 22 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
20 Jul 30.6 °C 19 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
21 Jul 31.0 °C 14 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
22 Jul 31.3 °C 16 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
23 Jul 31.6 °C 15 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
24 Jul after 29.9 °C 15 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
25 Jul after 29.1 °C 15 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
26 Jul after 30.5 °C 14 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
27 Jul after 31.4 °C 17 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
28 Jul after 31.7 °C 20 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
29 Jul after 31.5 °C 16 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
30 Jul after 32.3 °C 13 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
31 Jul after 32.2 °C 20 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
1 Aug after 30.3 °C 28 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
2 Aug after 31.7 °C 32 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 34

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 7 Jul 2018
After · 30 Jul 2018

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 · 201Every 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 14 July 2018 and 23 July 2018: 10 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 6,214 hectares (62.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Saurimo (6,240 ha, 0.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 31.9 °C, humidity dropped to 14 % and gusts hit 48 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.

Report an error
What do you think is wrong?

We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy.

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.