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Acreúna fire, September 2019 Acreúna, Santa Helena de Goiás, Turvelândia

Out · last detection 18 Sept 2019, 16:23 UTC

The fire started on 15 September 2019 in Acreúna, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 4 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,882 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.

It is the 374th largest in Goiás since 2016 (of 548 with a page). Number 669 in Brazil in 2019, of 974.

Burnt area
3,882ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
4days
15 Sept 2019 – 18 Sept 2019
Municipalities hit
3
municipalities
Started on
15 Sept
2019
Heat detections
106
in a single hotspot: 296 MW
Danger at start
54
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
5.1GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

18 Sept 2019
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 15 Sept18 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

15161718

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

The weather it burned in

39°high
49km/h · peak gust
10%lowest humidity

It had gone 39 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 11.7 mm on 25 Sept.

This area had burned before

30% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,151 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Acreúna 21,568 inhabitants where it started
    2,694 ha reached on 15 Sept
    1.7 %
  2. Santa Helena de Goiás 38,492 inhabitants
    1,153 ha reached on 16 Sept
    1.0 %
  3. Turvelândia 4,985 inhabitants
    59 ha
    0.1 %

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)
15 Sept 38.5 °C 13 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
16 Sept 38.0 °C 10 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
17 Sept 39.0 °C 12 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
18 Sept 38.1 °C 14 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 63
19 Sept after 38.6 °C 14 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 67
20 Sept after 37.9 °C 21 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
21 Sept after 37.5 °C 19 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
22 Sept after 37.9 °C 22 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
23 Sept after 36.9 °C 24 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
24 Sept after 37.1 °C 23 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
25 Sept after 34.2 °C 31 % 33 km/h 11.7 mm Low 9

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 8 Sept 2019
After · 25 Sept 2019

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 · 106Every 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 Brazil ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Acreúna fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 15 September 2019 and 18 September 2019: 4 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 3,882 hectares (38.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 3 municipalities: Acreúna (2,694 ha, 1.7 %); Santa Helena de Goiás (1,153 ha, 1.0 %); Turvelândia (59 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 39.0 °C, humidity dropped to 10 % and gusts hit 49 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 63, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Brazil (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: 193

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. This is not an emergency service: if there is a fire now, call 193.

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.