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Saurimo fire, 23 June 2022 Saurimo

Out · last detection 4 Jul 2022, 00:00 UTC

The fire started on 23 June 2022 in Saurimo, Angola, and satellites saw it burning for 11 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 13,767 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 20th largest in Lunda Sul since 2016 (of 240 with a page). Number 10 in Angola in 2022, of 143.

Burnt area
13,767ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
11days
23 Jun 2022 – 3 Jul 2022
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
23 Jun
2022
Heat detections
410
in a single hotspot: 74 MW
Danger at start
34
High · FWI index
Energy released
2.3GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

4 Jul 2022
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 23 Jun3 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

23242526272829301234

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

The weather it burned in

31°high
46km/h · peak gust
18%lowest humidity

It had gone 50 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

98% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 8,941 ha in 2016, 6,262 ha in 2017, 8,561 ha in 2018, 7,078 ha in 2019, 9,618 ha in 2020, 9,064 ha in 2021. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 13,504 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Saurimo where it started
    13,791 ha reached on 22 Jun
    0.6 %

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)
22 Jun 30.6 °C 24 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
23 Jun 30.7 °C 23 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
24 Jun 30.5 °C 20 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
25 Jun 30.3 °C 19 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
26 Jun 30.2 °C 23 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
27 Jun 29.6 °C 21 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
28 Jun 28.5 °C 21 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
29 Jun 28.2 °C 24 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
30 Jun 29.2 °C 23 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
1 Jul 30.1 °C 23 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
2 Jul 30.3 °C 22 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
3 Jul 30.6 °C 21 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
4 Jul after 30.6 °C 18 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
5 Jul after 30.5 °C 20 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
6 Jul after 30.1 °C 20 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
7 Jul after 29.5 °C 20 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
8 Jul after 30.7 °C 19 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
9 Jul after 31.0 °C 20 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
10 Jul after 31.0 °C 19 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
11 Jul after 31.2 °C 20 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
12 Jul after 30.4 °C 17 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
13 Jul after 30.5 °C 18 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
14 Jul after 30.8 °C 20 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
15 Jul after 30.5 °C 19 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
16 Jul after 30.2 °C 25 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
17 Jul after 30.1 °C 24 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
18 Jul after 29.7 °C 22 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
19 Jul after 31.1 °C 20 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
20 Jul after 30.8 °C 24 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 37

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 16 Jun 2022
After · 10 Jul 2022

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 · 410Every 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 23 June 2022 and 3 July 2022: 11 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 13,767 hectares (137.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Saurimo (13,791 ha, 0.6 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 31.0 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 46 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 46, 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.