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Arcelia fire, March 2020 Arcelia

Out · last detection 30 Mar 2020, 19:17 UTC

The fire started on 23 March 2020 in Arcelia, Mexico, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,607 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 281th largest in Guerrero since 2016 (of 612 with a page). Number 96 in Mexico in 2020, of 243.

The power measured by the satellite is low (12.4 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
2,607ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
8days
23 Mar 2020 – 30 Mar 2020
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
23 Mar
2020
Heat detections
123
in a single hotspot: 12 MW
Danger at start
36
High · FWI index
Energy released
509MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

30 Mar 2020
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 23 Mar30 Mar

How it evolved, day by day

2324252627282930

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

The weather it burned in

35°high
48km/h · peak gust
10%lowest humidity

It had gone 45 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

96% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,496 ha in 2017.

What happened to each town

  1. Arcelia where it started
    2,620 ha reached on 22 Mar
    3.4 %

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)
22 Mar 34.2 °C 23 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
23 Mar 33.1 °C 26 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
24 Mar 34.1 °C 22 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
25 Mar 34.1 °C 21 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
26 Mar 35.2 °C 17 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
27 Mar 34.2 °C 20 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
28 Mar 34.1 °C 18 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
29 Mar 33.7 °C 19 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
30 Mar 33.9 °C 22 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
31 Mar after 32.5 °C 21 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
1 Apr after 34.5 °C 18 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
2 Apr after 34.3 °C 19 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
3 Apr after 34.5 °C 19 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
4 Apr after 34.4 °C 13 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
5 Apr after 34.5 °C 10 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
6 Apr after 34.2 °C 13 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
7 Apr after 35.7 °C 19 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
8 Apr after 36.5 °C 15 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
9 Apr after 35.0 °C 11 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
10 Apr after 35.8 °C 12 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
11 Apr after 35.4 °C 10 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
12 Apr after 34.9 °C 17 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
13 Apr after 33.9 °C 18 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
14 Apr after 35.0 °C 21 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
15 Apr after 34.9 °C 17 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 16 Mar 2020
After · 6 Apr 2020

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 · 123Every 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 23 March 2020 and 30 March 2020: 8 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 2,607 hectares (26.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Arcelia (2,620 ha, 3.4 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 35.2 °C, humidity dropped to 10 % and gusts hit 48 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 47, class Very high.
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.