Fire near Kunene (AO)

16.46°S, 17.33°E · first detected on 24 September at 13:38

What the satellites measured

This fire was tracked from 24 September at 13:38 to 10 October at 14:34, that is 16 days, through 620 satellite detections. The detected extent reaches 10,240 ha.

Detected extent: 10,240 ha
Cumulative power: 8,799 MW
Peak power, one pixel: 154 MW
VIIRS and MODIS detections: 620
Estimated emissions: 10.5 kt of carbon; Carbon burnt in the 0.1 degree cells (about 10 km) around the fire, from 5 October 2026 to 10 October 2026. An order-of-magnitude estimate from GFAS (ECMWF, Copernicus CAMS): it also counts neighbouring fires in the same cell. Contains modified Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service information (2026).

These four figures cover the polar orbits alone, the ones that measure an area. The pass table below also counts geostationary detections, more frequent but too coarse for geometry, and its power column sums a whole pass where the peak above is that of a single pixel.

“Detected extent” is not “burned area”: it is the union of the ground footprints of the satellite pixels, and a pixel counts in full (375 m for VIIRS, 1 km for MODIS) even when only a forest edge is burning. Compared with press figures it is in practice one and a half to three times the area reported. Detections taken at the edge of the scan swath, too coarse to measure anything at all, are excluded. These figures come from thermal detection and are not an official assessment: only the emergency services and the competent authorities are authoritative.

Replay how the fire spread

The map is framed on this fire's footprint and loads only its detections. The timeline below covers the period in which satellites saw it, from the first to the last detection, with twelve hours before and twenty-four after; the ticks on the bar mark the emergency services' announcements that fall within it. The cursor opens on the most powerful pass, and playback replays the whole fire in about thirty seconds. “1 h” shows what is burning within an hour of the chosen moment : the map then follows the power curve below and empties when it falls. “24 h” stacks twenty-four hours : a fire stays visible between two satellite passes, which come two to four times a day. Both are true, but they say different things.

How the radiative power evolved

One point per satellite pass: the sum of the fire radiative power measured over the fire. This is the curve that says whether the fire eased off or picked up again, which no cumulative figure shows. The window covers 19 days; beyond that, clustering would merge two successive fires in the same place.

Fire dynamics

Loading history…

Satellite passes in detail

Pass	Power summed over the pass	Detections	Sensor
10 October at 14:34	17 MW	4	N20
10 October at 14:17	59 MW	2	N
10 October at 13:38	9 MW	1	N21
8 October at 21:36	21 MW	2	Terra
8 October at 17:14	86 MW	2	Aqua
8 October at 15:12	53 MW	6	N20
8 October at 14:51	395 MW	32	N
8 October at 14:17	166 MW	11	N21
8 October at 09:26	5 MW	1	Terra
8 October at 01:44	2 MW	2	N21
7 October at 16:37	107 MW	7	Aqua
7 October at 15:12	140 MW	16	N
7 October at 14:34	147 MW	13	N21
7 October at 13:50	172 MW	19	N20
6 October at 15:29	67 MW	7	N
6 October at 14:53	200 MW	10	N21
6 October at 14:10	41 MW	6	N20
6 October at 13:49	18 MW	2	N
5 October at 16:59	116 MW	6	Aqua
5 October at 15:12	442 MW	26	N21
5 October at 14:27	575 MW	35	N20
5 October at 14:10	540 MW	32	N
5 October at 13:32	535 MW	27	N21
4 October at 14:49	36 MW	1	N20
4 October at 14:27	66 MW	3	N
3 October at 15:06	30 MW	10	N20
3 October at 14:46	50 MW	8	N
3 October at 14:10	46 MW	6	N21
30 September at 15:06	19 MW	2	N21
30 September at 14:21	26 MW	5	N20
30 September at 14:02	56 MW	8	N
30 September at 09:09	7 MW	1	Terra
29 September at 16:29	81 MW	1	Aqua
29 September at 14:40	14 MW	1	N20
29 September at 14:21	31 MW	5	N
29 September at 13:45	36 MW	6	N21
29 September at 02:09	4 MW	2	N20
28 September at 14:59	185 MW	12	N20
28 September at 14:04	242 MW	14	N21
27 September at 16:50	229 MW	7	Aqua
27 September at 15:18	284 MW	23	N20
27 September at 14:59	222 MW	25	N
27 September at 14:21	342 MW	18	N21
27 September at 13:38	112 MW	12	N20
27 September at 01:50	2 MW	2	N21
26 September at 16:12	161 MW	3	Aqua
26 September at 15:18	64 MW	9	N
26 September at 14:42	140 MW	10	N21
26 September at 13:57	130 MW	22	N20
25 September at 17:12	250 MW	3	Aqua
25 September at 15:36	58 MW	5	N
25 September at 14:59	140 MW	17	N21
25 September at 14:17	189 MW	10	N20
25 September at 13:55	460 MW	22	N
24 September at 16:35	63 MW	2	Aqua
24 September at 15:21	83 MW	4	N21
24 September at 14:34	467 MW	27	N20
24 September at 14:17	275 MW	21	N
24 September at 13:38	266 MW	19	N21
22 September at 15:12	7 MW	2	N20
22 September at 14:51	3 MW	1	N

8 other fires near Kunene (AO)

Separate fires, apart in time or in space, not pieces of this one. A single municipality can have several over one summer, and a forest massif often covers more than a hundred square kilometres.

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