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Arcelia fire, 4 May 2019 Arcelia

Out · last detection 16 May 2019, 20:39 UTC

The fire started on 4 May 2019 in Arcelia, Mexico, and satellites saw it burning for 12 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,909 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 245th largest in Guerrero since 2016 (of 612 with a page). Number 146 in Mexico in 2019, of 364.

The power measured by the satellite is low (27.8 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.

Burnt area
2,909ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
12days
4 May 2019 – 15 May 2019
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
4 May
2019
Heat detections
162
in a single hotspot: 28 MW
Danger at start
46
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
763MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

16 May 2019
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 4 May15 May

How it evolved, day by day

4567910111213141516

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

The weather it burned in

37°high
42km/h · peak gust
9%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 2.4 mm on 26 May.

This area had burned before

8% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 232 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Arcelia where it started
    2,925 ha reached on 4 May
    3.9 %

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)
4 May 34.3 °C 21 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
5 May 34.7 °C 19 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
6 May 35.5 °C 18 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
7 May 36.6 °C 9 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
8 May 35.5 °C 10 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
9 May 35.1 °C 14 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
10 May 34.2 °C 15 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
11 May 36.6 °C 17 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
12 May 34.6 °C 24 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
13 May 35.0 °C 24 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
14 May 35.2 °C 22 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
15 May 34.9 °C 25 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
16 May after 34.2 °C 24 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
17 May after 33.1 °C 27 % 41 km/h 0.1 mm Very high 43
18 May after 34.7 °C 25 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
19 May after 36.4 °C 21 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
20 May after 36.9 °C 24 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
21 May after 35.9 °C 26 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
22 May after 35.9 °C 23 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
23 May after 35.4 °C 23 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
24 May after 34.4 °C 31 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
25 May after 34.3 °C 34 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
26 May after 34.1 °C 35 % 25 km/h 2.4 mm Moderate 15

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 27 Apr 2019
After · 22 May 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 · 162Every 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 Mexico ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Arcelia fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 4 May 2019 and 15 May 2019: 12 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 2,909 hectares (29.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Arcelia (2,925 ha, 3.9 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 36.6 °C, humidity dropped to 9 % and gusts hit 42 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 56, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Mexico (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: 911

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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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 911.

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 4.0 (CC BY 4.0)). 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.