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Saurimo fire, June 2023 Saurimo

Out · last detection 9 Jul 2023, 12:00 UTC

The fire started on 30 June 2023 in Saurimo, Angola, and satellites saw it burning for 10 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 6,341 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 141th largest in Lunda Sul since 2016 (of 240 with a page). Number 93 in Angola in 2023, of 158.

Burnt area
6,341ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
10days
30 Jun 2023 – 9 Jul 2023
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
30 Jun
2023
Heat detections
217
in a single hotspot: 103 MW
Danger at start
39
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
2.5GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

9 Jul 2023
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 30 Jun9 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

123456789

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
44km/h · peak gust
11%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

98% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,023 ha in 2016, 3,300 ha in 2017, 3,358 ha in 2018, 5,062 ha in 2019, 2,761 ha in 2020, 2,864 ha in 2021, 3,093 ha in 2022. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 6,234 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Saurimo where it started
    6,369 ha reached on 1 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)
30 Jun 33.2 °C 22 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
1 Jul 32.5 °C 15 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
2 Jul 32.7 °C 11 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
3 Jul 31.2 °C 13 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
4 Jul 31.6 °C 17 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
5 Jul 32.0 °C 19 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
6 Jul 32.2 °C 18 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
7 Jul 31.6 °C 18 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
8 Jul 31.2 °C 16 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
9 Jul 32.2 °C 17 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
10 Jul after 32.8 °C 18 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
11 Jul after 30.5 °C 15 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
12 Jul after 30.6 °C 16 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
13 Jul after 32.3 °C 17 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
14 Jul after 32.7 °C 16 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
15 Jul after 33.2 °C 14 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
16 Jul after 33.7 °C 12 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
17 Jul after 32.7 °C 13 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
18 Jul after 33.3 °C 14 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
19 Jul after 33.6 °C 16 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 23 Jun 2023
After · 16 Jul 2023

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 · 217Every 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 30 June 2023 and 9 July 2023: 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 6,341 hectares (63.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Saurimo (6,369 ha, 0.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 33.2 °C, humidity dropped to 11 % and gusts hit 44 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 52, 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.