How long did the Songea fire last?

According to the heat detections seen by satellite, it burned from 20 October 2026 to 29 October 2026 (10 days between the first and the last detection). There is no perimeter yet to date it.

How much area did it burn?

There is no perimeter yet. Heat detections rebuild about 3,150 hectares with fire (31.5 km²), a rough figure; GWIS will give its own when it publishes the perimeter, which can take several days.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 3 municipalities: Songea (2,240 ha, 0.2 %); Njombe (602 ha, 0.2 %); Kilombero (294 ha, 0.0 %).

Is the Songea fire still active?

Yes: satellites detected fire on 29 Oct 2026, 23:31 UTC. Check the emergency service for the official status.

Where does this data come from?

From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Tanzania (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

TZ · Tanzania · 2026-10-20 → 2026-10-29

Songea fire, 20 October 2026 Songea, Njombe, Kilombero

Burning · last detection 29 Oct 2026, 23:31 UTC

Satellites first detected fire on 20 October 2026 in Songea, Tanzania. It has been active for 10 days, with 249 heat detections and an area with fire of about 3,150 hectares rebuilt from them, spread across 3 municipalities.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Njombe · 2025 Njombe · 2016 Songea · 2017 Kilombero · 2021

GWIS (Copernicus) has not yet published the perimeter of this fire. It rebuilds it from hotspots, which can take several days, and it does not always arrive. For now the area is the one rebuilt from heat detections (about 14 hectares per pixel). If the perimeter arrives, this page picks it up on its own and keeps the same address.

Is it still active?

Satellites detected fire on 29 Oct 2026, 23:31 UTC. Everything suggests it is still burning. Satellites pass a few times a day and cloud or smoke can hide the fire: a lack of detections is not an official extinction. Each country’s emergency service declares a fire contained or out.

Area with fire: ≈ 3,150ha; rebuilt from hotspots, no official perimeter yet
Duration: 10days; 20 Oct 2026 – 29 Oct 2026
Municipalities hit: 3; districts
Started on: 20 Oct; 2026
Heat detections: 249; in a single hotspot: 353 MW
Average daily power: 402MW; detected power per day, on average

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 20 Oct29 Oct

Play back 29 Oct 2026

How it evolved, day by day

20 Oct 22 Oct 24 Oct 26 Oct 28 Oct

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

What happened to each town

Songea where it started

2,240 ha reached on 20 Oct

0.2 %
Njombe

602 ha reached on 20 Oct

0.2 %
Kilombero

294 ha reached on 22 Oct

0.0 %

Area with fire inside each municipality, rebuilt from heat detections (about 14 hectares per VIIRS pixel). An estimate until the official perimeter arrives. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 13 Oct 2026

After · 29 Oct 2026

Before After

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 · 249Every 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 time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Tanzania ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Songea fire last?: According to the heat detections seen by satellite, it burned from 20 October 2026 to 29 October 2026 (10 days between the first and the last detection). There is no perimeter yet to date it.
How much area did it burn?: There is no perimeter yet. Heat detections rebuild about 3,150 hectares with fire (31.5 km²), a rough figure; GWIS will give its own when it publishes the perimeter, which can take several days.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 3 municipalities: Songea (2,240 ha, 0.2 %); Njombe (602 ha, 0.2 %); Kilombero (294 ha, 0.0 %).
Is the Songea fire still active?: Yes: satellites detected fire on 29 Oct 2026, 23:31 UTC. Check the emergency service for the official status.
Where does this data come from?: From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Tanzania (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.

Emergency number: 112 · Emergency number and official warnings ›

Satellite cross-check

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · Copernicus ↗

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?

Dates or duration Place or towns Burned area Name It was not a wildfire Same fire as another page Something else

What really happened?

Your connection to the fire (optional) Email (optional)

We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy. This is not an emergency service: if there is a fire now, call 112.

How we know this

No perimeter yet: the area (≈ 3,150 ha) is estimated by counting VIIRS pixels with fire, about 14 ha each.
Dates of the first and last VIIRS detection of the cluster. 249 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.

How we build fire pages: methodology ›

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 3.0 Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY 3.0 IGO)). 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.