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Alhué fire, 7 January 2017 Alhué

Out · last detection 15 Jan 2017, 05:37 UTC

The fire started on 7 January 2017 in Alhué, Chile, and satellites saw it burning for 9 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,513 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 11th largest in Región Metropolitana de Santiago since 2016 (of 29 with a page). Number 29 in Chile in 2017, of 56.

Burnt area
2,513ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
9days
7 Jan 2017 – 15 Jan 2017
Municipalities hit
1
communes
Started on
7 Jan
2017
Heat detections
149
in a single hotspot: 143 MW
Danger at start
26
High · FWI index
Energy released
3.9GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

15 Jan 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 7 Jan15 Jan

How it evolved, day by day

789101112131415

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

The weather it burned in

32°high
49km/h · peak gust
20%lowest humidity

It had gone 11 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

  1. Alhué where it started
    2,518 ha reached on 7 Jan
    3.0 %

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)
7 Jan 28.2 °C 31 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
8 Jan 27.7 °C 27 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
9 Jan 27.6 °C 31 % 35 km/h 0.9 mm Moderate 19
10 Jan 28.2 °C 30 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
11 Jan 30.8 °C 24 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
12 Jan 31.3 °C 20 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
13 Jan 32.0 °C 26 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
14 Jan 28.9 °C 28 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
15 Jan 28.2 °C 24 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
16 Jan after 29.0 °C 27 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
17 Jan after 32.2 °C 25 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
18 Jan after 31.9 °C 16 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
19 Jan after 32.3 °C 16 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
20 Jan after 34.2 °C 17 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
21 Jan after 31.8 °C 27 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
22 Jan after 28.2 °C 37 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
23 Jan after 29.5 °C 21 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
24 Jan after 30.1 °C 29 % 55 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
25 Jan after 32.3 °C 29 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 31

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 31 Dec 2016
After · 22 Jan 2017

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 · 149Every 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 Chile ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Alhué fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 7 January 2017 and 15 January 2017: 9 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 2,513 hectares (25.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Alhué (2,518 ha, 3.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 32.0 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 49 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 33, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Chile (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: 130 (CONAF) · 132

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 130 (CONAF) · 132.

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 ADM3 (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.